When he was last in office during a global crisis, Donald Trump’s crazy press conferences contributed to the country souring on him. Now, his frequent media availabilities serve as powerful reminders of why the American people rejected him in 2020.
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In the latter part of his presidency, Joe Biden’s staff worked hard to keep him away from the media and its questions and its cameras. In fact, his team was so good at it that people realized only too late that Biden was in no shape to run for a second term.
For different reasons, Donald Trump’s handlers may want some pointers on how to shield their charge from pesky journalists.
Because every time the president answers questions from reporters, it becomes apparent that he has no idea what he is talking about.
Of course, those who observed Trump on the campaign trail know that this is also the case when he holds rallies and muses about fictional cannibals, sharks, windmills, and Arnold Palmer’s genitals. However, in those cases, at least he is the one setting the agenda.
It is a different story when Trump takes questions in the White House or on Air Force One. In those cases, he is weighing in on topics that reporters choose, which often puts his complete ignorance on full display.
It’s not just that the president is extremely ill-informed when it comes to things happening in his administration; he is also not terribly bright.
However, with the supreme confidence of a narcissist, he just keeps answering, getting facts wrong, waxing poetically about how little girls need fewer dolls, or telling workers that it’s a good thing that they are losing their jobs. Maybe all those laid off longshoremen in California can become guards at Alcatraz when Trump reopens that.
Trump is at his best/worst when he is talking about his tariffs because it is so painfully apparent that he has no clue how the economy works.
He makes it sound as though the purchase of goods and services is somehow a loss for the United States, and that the tariffs will be paid by foreign countries instead of being borne by American businesses and consumers.
One answer at a time, his press conferences are a potpourri of nonsense, and his answers are quickly dissected into bite-size clips and disseminated online so that people can realize that their president is an idiot.
We have been here before.
During the early phase of the coronavirus crisis, Trump held daily press conferences with experts that conveyed misplaced confidence regarding how severe the pandemic would be and a whole lot of other nonsense.
Even though the country seems to have developed a case of collective amnesia regarding that time, surely people must remember some of the president’s greatest COVID-19 whoppers, like suggesting that things would blow over within a few weeks or that injecting disinfectant might be a good idea.
The reason why Americans ended up rejecting Trump that year is because his narrative obviously did not match reality and people saw with their own eyes how bad things were.
Well, that alternate reality-creating version of the president is back. To be fair, it never left; it’s just that enough voters in 2024 apparently forgot what we are dealing with here.
While his staffers would probably prefer it if the president talked to the press less often, there is just one problem: Trump loves it.
He not only views himself as highly intelligent and eminently capable, but he also loves the idea of being seen on TV screens across the globe. And, of course, he has a love-hate relationship with the press corps.
And that’s why he will keep doing these near-daily press availabilities. We just hope that the country is paying attention when Trump says he doesn’t know if he should follow the Constitution, when he wonders out loud whether US citizens can be trafficked abroad, or when he makes fabulist claims about the state of the economy.
Because, when it becomes apparent that he is tanking the economy and annihilating the rule of law, it will once again be up to the American people to make a change at the ballot box.
In his Navigating the Insanity columns, Klaus Marre provides the kind of hard-hitting, thought-provoking, and often humorous analysis you won’t find anywhere else.
