The media are going to have to come up with a new name for Trump rallies.
Maybe call them lie-a-thons.
The real nemesis at these events isn’t “radical left Democrats.” What the former president really takes on is truth. The poor thing took a beating again in Selma, North Carolina, on Saturday.
Out, of course, came the “Big Lie.” “The truth is,” said the former president who lost his 2020 re-election bid by 7 million votes, “I ran twice. I won twice.”
A number of post-rally commentaries and fact checks documented the almost comical toll of misstatements and distortions by the man who declared to the crowd: “I think I’m the most honest human being perhaps that God ever created.”
The distortions began – as Donald Trump’s administration began – with a wild exaggeration about crowd size. Right Side Broadcasting Network put the number at more than 15,000. Lars Dolder, a News & Observer reporter covering the event, said a generous count would be more like 3,500.
The gap between claims and reality is about more than pandering to Trump’s grandiosity. It’s a telling measure of how his appeal is faltering. That’s a problem for Trump and his ability to squeeze dollars out of his devoted followers. But it’s a bigger problem for the Republican Party.
Eager to have Trump’s base, the Republican Party allowed itself to become the Party of Trump. But as Trump’s drawing power and his base shrink, the party is increasingly split and adrift.
What is it now? The Party of Tax Cuts? The Party of Anti-Transgender People? The Party of Sealing the Southern Border?
Even Trump doesn’t seem to know. He railed against “transgenderism” yet he mocked former Republican Gov. Pat McCrory – now a Senate candidate – as the “bathroom governor.” That’s because McCrory signed House Bill 2, which said transgender people could only use restrooms in state and local public buildings that matched the gender assigned to them at birth.
“Oh, what a mess that was,” Trump said of the fallout from House Bill 2. But he also gave a shoutout for the reelection of U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop, who, as a state lawmaker, was the architect of the law, which caused boycotts of North Carolina.
Michael Whatley, chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party, also got an “attaboy” from the former president. It’s a wonder Whatley was there since Trump is splitting the state GOP and promoting its most divisive candidates.
In addition to belittling McCrory, Trump is backing U.S. Rep. Ted Budd for the party’s Senate nomination. Budd, a gun store owner and hard-right politician who is little known outside his 13th District, is unlikely to win a statewide election in a purple state.
Trump is also supporting U.S. Rep. Madison Cawthorn, a one-man wrecking crew of the Republican brand, and Bo Hines, a political newcomer who wants to represent Selma and Johnston County even though most recently he lived in Winston-Salem. Finally, Trump touted Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who is in a contest with Cawthorn to be the state’s most extreme politician.
At one point Trump paused in his remarks to comment on a passing train sounding its horn. He said the conductor was a Trump fan honking his approval. Maybe, but Republicans should have heard that horn for its real function – a warning about what’s coming down the tracks.
Republicans will likely do well in the midterm elections, as the party opposite the party that holds the White House usually does. This time the counter wave could be especially strong given President Joe Biden’s low approval rating. But those numbers are not so much a rejection of Democratic priorities as they are a reflection of an electorate that is uneasy and weary amid inflation and the persistence of the pandemic.
The best political approach for the Republican Party now is not to rally around Trump. It’s to rally around the truth. Focus on real problems and offer real solutions.
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ABOUT THE WRITER
Ned Barnett is associate opinion editor for the News & Observer.
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