Donald Trump’s lies and bizarre antics disguised a darker side

Editorial: The outgoing leader’s arrogance defeated his ambition, for he could not change his ways

What will Donald Trump leave behind? Last year, Ivanka Trump tweeted an image of her father at Mount Rushmore, posing with an unusually natural smile, as if ready to be carved in stone next to George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. It was no accident; according to the local governor of South Dakota, President Trump had actually inquired about the possibility of joining his peers on the national memorial. Mr Trump dismissed such reports as “fake news”, a phrase he made his own, with no trace of irony.

Yet the Mount Rushmore story was a telling, rather typical example of what immediately comes to mind when reflecting on the past four years – the crazy stuff. Sometimes it was the vanity. There was that impressive construction of tangerine hair, like a dish of spun sugar balanced precariously on the presidential pate. Or the plausible claim made by one of his many former advisers that he seriously considered taking the oath of office with a copy of The Art of the Deal, rather than the usual bible. Or the incessant, childish, spiteful, angry, unreal tweets, including the still-unsolved “covfefe” riddle.  

Other moments were simply bizarre – such as when he thought out loud about using disinfectants and sunlight internally to treat Covid patients – and must, at last, have broken the patience of even the most conservative Republicans. 

All (relatively) harmless episodes, but of course there was a much darker, more malicious, reckless and destructive side to President Trump that was always near or at the surface, and which spewed out to such devastating and lasting effect in the insurrection he inspired on 6 January, a date which will live in infamy. That was the Trump who regarded neo-fascists in Charlottesville as “very fine people”, the Trump who ordered the children of refugees to be separated from their families and who executed the insane. A talented if accidental master of propaganda, Mr Trump has persuaded too many Americans that their media, their politicians (“the swamp”), their courts, the business world and their entire system of governance is corrupt, unworthy, lying, thieving and that only he could save them from their predations.

The truth of course was the precise opposite. It was the 45th president who generated the fake news, who used the office for his own purposes, whose presidential campaign benefited from Russian interference and tried to subvert the constitution and the rule of law. Mr Trump is the only president to have been impeached twice, and was probably lucky to get away with just the pair of indictments. From the absurd “birther” conspiracy theory to babyish claims about his inauguration crowd to the denial of his election defeat to Joe Biden, it is Donald Trump who has shifted America into a looking glass world of “alternative facts”. He has gaslighted an entire nation, or at least a substantial portion of it, a perverse achievement in itself.  

His views on women were appalling. He inflamed racial tensions and encouraged culture wars and the mob.  

He could never find a kind word to say about an opponent, even ridiculing a war hero such as John McCain, while the young Mr Trump escaped military service in Vietnam. Yet that is all the more reason to try to find something of value in President Trump’s record – because, as Michelle Obama observed, “when they go low, we go high”.

First, there was the economy. Mr Trump’s tax cuts favoured the mega-rich and the corporates, but his borrow and spend policies helped stimulate economic growth and the stock market (and thus Americans’ pension pots). Job creation was impressive and may have had some boost from protectionism (though to the detriment of American consumers and longer-term economic efficiency). Trump fans claim that he didn’t start any new wars, though that may have come at the price of appeasing Russia and North Korea.  

He did bomb Syria, reportedly at the behest of his daughter, and directed the assassination of an Iranian general – both acts that at least served the purpose of restraining America’s enemies. He probably made Nato partners think again about how much they should pay for their own security, and what they might do if the US could not be relied on. Arguably, the normalisation of relations with Israel by the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan may have stabilised the Middle East; moving the US embassy to Jerusalem did the opposite.  

President Trump also delivered much of his fabled wall with Mexico (who did not pay for it), and made sure his Supreme Court nominees would carry a louder conservative voice on the law for decades to come.  

On the biggest issues, Mr Trump was always plain wrong. On climate change, on his country’s political culture, and on exercising responsible global leadership, President Trump was a disaster. If he had shown even modest success against Covid-19, rather than claiming it was a hoax, he might have won his second term. In a way, his arrogance defeated his ambition, for he could not change his ways.  

And so the slogan “America First” turned out to be a poor guide to making America great again. It transpired that Donald Trump, who made not being a “career politician” into such a virtue, was not up to the job, especially as he rarely listened to advice or learnt from his errors, and sacked anyone who dared to refuse to echo his fantasies. For those reasons, Mr Trump lost his job. For those reasons, for most of his fellow citizens, he will be neither forgotten nor forgiven. Even if his hairdo would be easier to carve into the granite rock, Donald Trump won’t end up on Mount Rushmore.