Trump’s 2020 Election Strategy in 25 Steps
By Robert Reich
To
watch this video on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD2BhCjbId0&feature=emb_title
Trump
will do anything to be re-elected. His opponents are limited because they
believe in democracy. Trump has no limits because he doesn’t.
Here’s
Trump’s re-election playbook, in 25 simple steps:
1. Declare yourself above the law.
2. Use racist fearmongering. Demand “law and order” and describe protesters as “thugs”, “lowlife” and “rioters and looters”. Describe Covid-19 as “Kung-Flu”. Retweet posts from white supremacists. In your campaign ads, use a symbol associated with Nazis.
3. Appoint an attorney general more loyal to you
than to America, and politicize the Department of Justice so it’s lenient on your loyalists and comes down hard on your enemies. Have it lighten the sentence
of a crony convicted of lying under oath. Order investigations of industries
you dislike.
4. Fire US attorneys who are investigating you.
5. Fire independent inspectors general who are
looking into what you’ve done. Crush any
whistleblowers you find.
6. Demean and ignore the intelligence community. Appoint a
director of national intelligence more loyal to you than to America. Demand
that the head of the FBI pledge loyalty to you.
7. Pack the federal courts with judges and
justices more loyal to you than to the constitution.
8. Politicize the Department of Defense so
generals will back whatever you order. Refer to them as
“my generals”. Have them help clear out protesters. Order the military to
surveil protesters. Tell governors you’ll bring in the military to stop
protesters.
9. Purge your party of anyone disloyal to you
and turn it into a mindless, brainless, spineless cult.
10. Get rid of accumulated experience and
expertise in government. Demean career public servants.
Hollow out the state department, the Department of Justice, Health and Human
Services, and public health.
11. Reward donors and cronies with bailouts,
tax breaks, subsidies, government contracts, regulatory rollbacks and plum jobs. Put their
lobbyists in charge of your agencies. Distribute $500bn in pandemic assistance
to corporations in secret, without any oversight.
12. Coddle dictators. Don’t
criticize their human rights abuses. Refuse to work with the leaders of other democracies. Withdraw from international treaties.
13. Create scapegoats. Demonize
migrants and lock up asylum-seekers at the border even if they’re children. Put a white nationalist in charge of immigration policy. Blame Muslims, Mexicans and
Chinese.
14. Denigrate and ridicule all critics. Describe
opponents as “human scum”. Attack the mainstream media as
purveyors of “fake news” and “enemies of the people”.
15. Conjure up conspiracies against yourself supposedly
led by your predecessor and your opponent in the last election. Without any
evidence, accuse your predecessor of “treason”. Fabricate a “Deep State” out to
get you.
16. Downplay real threats to the nation, such as a
rapidly spreading pandemic. Lie about your utter failure to contain it. Muzzle
public health experts. Urge people to go back to work even as the pandemic
worsens in parts of the country.
17. Encourage armed supporters to “liberate”
states from
elected officials who disagree with you.
18. Bribe other nations to investigate your
electoral opponent and flood social media with
lies about him.
19. Use rightwing propaganda machines like Fox
News and conspiracy theory peddling One America News to inundate the
country with your lies. Ensure that the morally bankrupt chief executive of
Facebook allows you to spread your lies on the biggest media machine in the
world.
20. Suppress the votes of people likely to vote
against you. Intimidate voters of color. Encourage Republican
governors to purge voter rolls, demand voter ID and close polling places.
21. Seek to prevent mail-in ballots during the
pandemic. Claim they will
cause voter fraud, without evidence. Threaten to close the US postal service.
22. Get Vladimir Putin to hack into US election
machines, as he did in 2016 but
can now do with more experience and deftness. Promise him that
in return you’ll further destabilize America as well as NATO. Allow him to put
a bounty on killing U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
23. If it still looks like you’ll be voted out,
try to postpone the election.
24. If you’re voted out of office
notwithstanding all this, refuse to leave. Contest
the election, claim massive fraud, say it’s a conspiracy, get your cult of a
political party to support your lies, get your propaganda machine to repeat
them, get your justice department to back you, get your judges and justices to
affirm you, get your generals to suppress any subsequent rebellion.
25. Declare victory.
Memo to America:
Beware Trump’s playbook. Spread the truth. Stay vigilant. Fight for our
democracy.
Robert Reich's latest book is "THE SYSTEM: Who Rigged
It, How To Fix It," out March 24.
He is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the 10 most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written 17 other books, including the best sellers "Aftershock,""The Work of Nations," "Beyond Outrage," and "The Common Good." He is a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, founder of Inequality Media, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentaries "Inequality For All," and "Saving Capitalism," both now streaming on Netflix.
He is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the 10 most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written 17 other books, including the best sellers "Aftershock,""The Work of Nations," "Beyond Outrage," and "The Common Good." He is a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, founder of Inequality Media, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentaries "Inequality For All," and "Saving Capitalism," both now streaming on Netflix.