The narcissism of MAGA and Trump's smear campaign against Kamala Harris
Why the election is so close with democracy on the line.
Note: Narcissists are found in people of all political affiliations and creeds. What’s being discussed here is specifically the tenets of the MAGA which is centered on the flawed concept that America would be great again without equality and liberty for all.
In 2024, just days before the election, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are statistically tied in the polls—both nationally and in swing states—and Kamala Harris’s lead has narrowed.
People in denial about this need to stop being in denial. Polls can be manipulated. They can be incorrect. But they are still data. And the data show that this race is tight.
The real question is why is the race so close?
Maybe it made sense when Joe Biden was Trump’s opponent and demonstrated cognitive decline during that disastrous first debate with Trump. But Kamala Harris isn’t suffering from cognitive decline. Meanwhile, Donald Trump is 78—almost two decades older than Kamala Harris—and starting to show wobbles.
It’s not the economy—at least not factually.
Because the economy is doing pretty well. Under the Biden Administration, real gross domestic product (GDP) in the United States is the highest of any developed country by a wide margin. GDP increased at an annual rate of 2.8 percent in the third quarter of 2024. Inflation is down to 2.1 percent by some measures. The cumulative price index is up 22 percent since 2020, but wages have outpaced inflation at 24 percent.
Under the Biden/Harris Administration, America has both lowered inflation and avoided a recession. The stock market has recovered. The Fed is lowering interest rates.
We might be looking at an economic boom in 2025.
But you know perfectly well, as I do, that this presidential race isn’t really about facts and data or which candidate is better.
Donald Trump isn’t the Republican nominee for the presidency because he’s the most qualified person for the job. He’s a populist avatar for an extremist agenda. His job is to win so that his billionaire backers can “drain the swamp” (i.e. mass firing dedicated civil servants) and potentially rig the system so that no candidate other than an extremist conservative can ever win again.
The agenda includes:
A possible federal ban on abortion
Deliberately tanking the economy (yes, really)
Mass deportations without due process
Ending citizenship for the children of immigrants
Abolishing the ACA (Obamacare)
Delegitimizing Trans people
Retributions against political enemies
Taking control of trade and media
Gutting the federal government
Lowering taxes for billionaires
Terminating energy regulations (pro pollution)
Raising prices through tariffs
Defunding public education and dictating what can be taught
Denying inconvenient scientific research
Giving more rights to Christians than other people
Supporting Israel to swiftly end the war in Gaza through violence
And a bunch of other horrifying things.
If you don’t believe this, I don’t know what to tell you. It’s laid out in Project 2025 and things Trump has bragged about publicly and published as Agenda 47. I know many of Trump’s voters don’t believe it. They believe whatever lies Donald Trump tells them, or whatever they read on social media that confirms what they want to believe.
It’s actually not Donald Trump that worries me at this point. What worries me is that half of Americans seemingly want Donald Trump—a lying fascist—to become President of the United States to enact this agenda, even though he was already rejected by the people in 2020.
I know Trump says that the 2020 election was rigged, but over 60 court cases yielded no evidence of widespread voter fraud anywhere in the country. Trump is even on video openly admitting he lost the election.
But that’s not surprising because Donald Trump is a serial cheater.
He doesn’t care about truth.
He doesn’t care about anything, or anyone, except himself.
He has active contempt for people he considers beneath him—which is all working Americans and anyone who doesn’t flatter or threaten him.
He is scared of going to prison, which might happen if he doesn’t win this election as he has already been convicted of federal crimes. His sentencing will take place on November 26, 2024. But if he wins the election, that may not happen.
Thus, the wild and desperate lies.
But none of that matters because millions of people have bought into what Donald Trump pretends to be. They like that Donald Trump is a seemingly rich asshole that the law can’t touch. They believe he is being persecuted by Democrats and the mainstream media rather than held accountable for things he has said and done. They actually think he will be better for the economy. They actually think he will make America safer.
In fact, they believe that Kamala Harris and the Democrats are the real danger.
Sincerely.
How did we get here?
Well, the first thing to understand is that the anger, fear, and hatred of Donald Trump’s campaign isn’t a bug. It’s a feature.
The MAGA movement is misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, racist, ableist and all the rest—often without knowing it, because MAGA voters don’t seem to understand what these words mean. They imagine “real” -ism/-ic as something more extreme than what they think and feel. But they laugh and jeer when Donald Trump says misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, racist, and ableist things. And they support misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, racist, and ableist legislation.
Then they say it’s just a joke and that you’re too sensitive if you’re offended—or scared of losing your rights.
They’re not in the wrong. You’re just too politically correct.
And Donald Trump is NEVER at fault.
If there’s one thing Donald Trump is exceptionally good at, it’s avoiding accountability. People praise him for it. The media normalizes it.
I’ve heard it said that the problem is that the media forces equivalency for presidential candidates where no equivalency should exist. In order to appear unbiased, presidential candidates are given equal time and credence in news reporting, no matter how crummy they are. The news media wants a close race because a close race gets clicks. Therefore, the media will manufacture a close race if it has to, downplaying the bad of Donald Trump and casting frivolous aspersions on his opponent to level the playing field.
There is some truth to this. And it doesn’t help. But it’s not the primary explanation for why Donald Trump is getting so much support.
It’s actually worse than that.
Donald Trump gets more media attention than Kamala Harris, except where coverage of Harris is a barrage of smear tactics on Fox News.
Because people like what he’s saying.
The real problem is that Donald Trump has narcissistic personality disorder and is running a narcissistic campaign for a MAGA movement that is steeped in narcissism.
Let me explain.
First, before you scream at me not to make “armchair diagnoses”, this isn’t a diagnosis. I am not a psychiatrist. I cannot diagnose anyone. I am giving an opinion.
Also, I don’t care what articles you may have read from so-called experts that say Trump is not a narcissist because it’s impossible for him to have a mental illness if he isn’t “suffering”. This is just evidence that Donald Trump has many apologists and enablers and that narcissism isn’t very well understood. Many therapists don’t understand it. It’s shockingly common, actually, for therapists to side with narcissists against victims when and if they do ever show up in therapy.
Narcissism is difficult to understand.
It’s alien to anyone who has empathy for other people.
I know because I grew up in a narcissistic family dynamic. It took two years of therapy for me to understand what was going on and the role I played as the empathetic family scapegoat. The narcissistic dynamic I had been conditioned to defend was like being under an enchantment.
Let me try to explain it to you.
In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), there’s a list of criteria for how to identify a narcissist:
A grandiose sense of self-importance
A preoccupation with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
A belief that he or she is special and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people or institutions
A need for excessive admiration
A sense of entitlement
Interpersonally exploitive behavior
A lack of empathy
Envy of others or a belief that others are envious of him or her
A demonstration of arrogant and haughty behaviors or attitudes
While I think you can check every one of these boxes for Donald Trump, I don’t think this list of criteria is that useful outside of the field of psychiatry.
It’s better to explain narcissism in layman’s terms:
First, narcissism is NOT vanity. The problem with Trump isn’t that he thinks he’s good looking and the most “tremendous” at whatever in a way you wouldn’t believe. I mean, yes, he is vain. He talks about himself in superlatives constantly. His core business before he became a politician was putting his name on the world’s tallest buildings in giant letters. But people can be vain and not have narcissistic personality disorder.
Narcissism is also NOT a pattern of abusive or exploitative behavior. Narcissism isn’t defined by love bombing and discarding. Again, many narcissists do engage in manipulative and abusive behavior, and I think there’s plenty of evidence that Trump does this, but people who are not narcissists can also be manipulative and abusive. Abuse is abuse.
What makes narcissism a “mental illness” is not a list of criteria, neither individually nor in aggregate. It’s a personality disorder when there is a distortion of reality that affects the narcissist as well as the people around them that is based on how they perceive themselves. And by “affects” I don’t mean they have to be upset about it. Narcissists are genuinely pretty pleased with themselves. That doesn’t mean their distortions don’t have a negative impact on their lives.
The very nature of narcissistic personality disorder makes it very unlikely that narcissists will seek therapy. The whole problem is that they think they are above reproach. But just because they aren’t diagnosed doesn’t mean they don’t exist.
It may be worth pointing out that the word “narcissism” comes from a Greek myth of Narcissus. There are different versions of the story, but the gist of it is that Narcissus is in love with his own reflection to the point that he either dies of hunger from staring at himself or tries to merge with his reflection and falls into the river and drowns. Narcissus is the product of trauma—specifically rape—and there is a prophesy that he would live a long life so long as he never comes “to know himself.”
Basically, Narcissus is unable to love himself because the real him is too painful to acknowledge. He can only love his reflection, which is a distortion.
People with narcissistic personality disorder are like this mythical figure. They are in love with a projected image of themselves. The image is not how they look. It is a distortion of who they are. Anyone who questions the distortion is attacked in order to preserve the lie.
This can manifest in many different ways. Some narcissists are grandiose, believing they are God’s gift to the world. Others are covert, believing they are martyrs underserving of criticism of any kind.
A few literary examples may help to illustrate:
In the Great Divorce, a Christian fantasy about ghosts trapped in purgatory by C.S. Lewis, there is a ghost named Frank, also called the Dwarf, who operates the Tragedian, a puppet he wants everyone to believe is him, even though everyone can plainly see the puppet in the afterlife. In life, Frank used this projection of himself to make everyone who loved him feel guilty all the time.
In the Wizard of Oz, the Great and Powerful Oz is neither great nor powerful. He’s a conman pulling levers behind a curtain that operate a scary-looking mask used to control the people of the Emerald City and scare away outsiders.
Technically, Oz isn’t really a narcissist as he doesn’t believe that the masked version of him is real to the extent that he threatens anyone who doesn’t pay homage to it. He’s actually quite nice to Dorothy once she figures out his scheme. But I include this example because it’s well-known and visually illustrative of the concept. I also include it because The Wizard of Oz is thought to be an allegory about the rise of Populism in 1890 politics in the American Midwest.
Narcissists are dangerous because of the lengths they will go to deny truth to protect the warped projection of themselves. This makes meaningful relationships impossible. They are too emotionally immature to ever admit to being frauds. They will lie and distort reality to avoid accountability. And if/when they are criticized, they will react with rage and retribution.
No one who does any of this should be President of the United States.
Unfortunately, narcissists often rise to positions of power. They are masters of manipulation. Their entire existence is bent on making people believe they are smarter, more successful, and more deserving than they are. And they are often entertaining in a “can’t look away from this trainwreck” kind of way.
Donald Trump projects an absurdly grandiose image of himself and it doesn’t seem to matter that it is riddled with contradictions. He wants people to believe he is a successful businessman of many failed businesses, a true patriot who doesn’t believe in democracy or the rule of law (and will leave America if he loses), a devout Christian who knows nothing about Jesus or the Bible, and the only hope for America against “open borders” from which murderous illegals are supposed pouring in unchecked (not true).
The lies he tells are uncountable. The contradictions are innumerable.
It should be comical. But’s it’s not.
It’s scary because of how many people believe his lies or think they don’t matter.
In my opinion, this is because MAGA itself is a narcissistic movement.
Donald Trump didn’t invent the slogan “Make American Great Again.” It’s been used in political campaigns before. It was used by Ronald Reagan.
What “Great” era is being referred to in this slogan? I would argue it doesn’t exist. It is a narcissistic projection of an America that never was. Some people imagine it refers to the time before Obama was president. Or Ronald Reagan. Or the 1950s before Civil Rights (which was idyllic for certain groups only due to government spending on the middle class—Kamala Harris’s plan). Some imagine the Gilded Age before women’s suffrage, the Great Depression, and the New Deal. Some imagine a time even more distant, such as when slavery was culturally acceptable, or when the Puritans first crossed the ocean to practice their religion free of government authority.
But you can’t tell anyone in MAGA this. There’s no single agreed upon idea of what makes America “great” and why, or how that greatness was lost, except that it has something to do with liberalism. Any attack on a projected idea of America held sacred incurs retaliation. In some ways, this explains the vitriol the Far Right feels toward the Progressive Left. Recognizing the need for progress means acknowledging that flaws exist.
Narcissism goes hand and hand with authoritarianism, which targets critical thinking, and the fear of equality, which threatens hierarchy.
Hierarchy is essential for people who think they are better than or more deserving than other people. In a patriarchal structure, gender roles must be rigid. Women are women. Men are men. Fathers have authority. Wives are submissive. Legislative progress that blurs these distinctions are anathema to narcissists who buy into this paradigm (and that includes a lot of self-hating women).
Cue contempt for women and LGTBQ+, and especially the Trans movement, which blurs gender distinctions and threatens the paradigm.
Religion plays into this too. Christian nationalism in particular is both deeply misogynistic and narcissistic. Christian nationalists don’t focus on the teachings of Jesus. They emphasize submission to authority and the infallibility of their beliefs. They are certain there is only one truth, one way to salvation, and that America must be a Christian nation. As God’s chosen candidate to enact this vision, Donald Trump doesn’t need to be perfect because God is perfect. A vote for Donald Trump is a vote for God.
This has more in common with the divine right of kings than democracy, but that doesn’t bother Christian Nationalists. They don’t value democracy. Democracy is rooted in equality. They want authoritarianism. Only by strongarming the system can Christian beliefs and values be elevated above the rest and forced on everyone else.
Misogyny is also central to this worldview, which research on authoritarian regimes the world over has shown. By controlling women, you enforce a patriarchal structure by which families, the building blocks of nations, can also be controlled. By forcing women into roles of indentured servitude, men will prosper.
Scared yet?
Think twice before you speak out about it. In dysfunctional families—and nations—truth speakers threaten the paradigm and must be scapegoated.
This is easy:
Accuse them of being oversensitive.
Accuse them of being crazy.
Accuse them of lying.
Accuse them of crimes.
Nitpick every little inaccuracy.
Create an impossible bar.
Criticize them.
Gaslight them.
Abuse them.
Smear them.
As for the MAGA candidate? He’s infallible. If he says something offensive, it is just his sense of humor. If he’s rude, it is just the way he talks. If something his campaign says or does is unpopular, he had nothing to do with it.
When accused, invoke the narcissist’s prayer:
That didn't happen.
And if it did, it wasn't that bad.
And if it was, that's not a big deal.
And if it is, that's not my fault.
And if it was, I didn't mean it.
And if I did, you deserved it.
If criticism persists, prepare the DARVO playbook:
Deny
Attack
Reverse
Victim and
Offender
Basically this:
Seriously, it doesn’t matter how small the criticism is or how long ago it was. Trump is still nursing a vendetta against windmills because of the lawsuit he lost over a windfarm built near one of his golf courses in Scotland.
He doesn’t even need to be criticized first. Just the fact that Kamala Harris is running against him is enough to lie incessantly and smear her. He would do this to any opponent, and—in fact—says the exact same things about Kamala Harris that he said about Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton.
In my opinion, Donald Trump is tied with Kamala Harris in the polls because of DARVO attacks. That’s why social media is rife with baseless claims like:
Kamala Harris is unpopular with voters (no, Trump is)
Kamala Harris is low intelligence (no, Trump is)
Kamala Harris is exhausted from campaigning (no, Trump is)
Kamala Harris is going to try and steal the election (no, Trump is)
Kamala Harris is rattled and frightened (no, Trump is)
Kamala Harris is refusing to do interviews (no, Trump is)
Kamala Harris is a fascist; Trump is the “opposite” of a Nazi (just no)
And so on.
This finger pointing is confusing and exhausting to people. But people who don’t read the news, don’t trust the media, don’t trust politicians, and don’t fact check are at risk of being taken in by sensational lies. In my opinion, this is why Kamala Harris has lost her lead in the polls and may lose the election. There was a honeymoon when she was first nominated and began her tour across the country. It took awhile to seed the smear campaigns. But in the intervening weeks, they blossomed.
Insults and lies travel faster than truth.
And they are easier to believe.
I believe this is why the Harris campaign is courting disaffected but informed Republicans.
Trust me, Kamala Harris doesn’t agree with Liz Cheney on any meaningful positions of policy. She has said as much, point blank. But the Democrats need to broaden the tent, and that means finding ways to give permission to people who have voted Republican their entire lives to vote Democrat in this election.
They hope to do this by showing that other Republicans acknowledge the danger that Donald Trump represents, that his campaign is not only fascist, but executing a near blow-by-blow for how Hitler rose to power in the 1930s.
It’s not complicated.
Start with a charismatic leader. Tell lies. Make them big. Spread anger and fear about the state of the nation, especially the economy and loss of freedom, even if it’s made up. Blame it on the communists, immigrants, uppity women, and “the gays”. Promise a solution that only you can provide. Disavow anything unpopular. Cheat. Accuse your opponent of everything said in fear about you. Rinse and repeat.
Once in power, rig the system to stay in power. Rule with fear. Divide the people. Stoke hatred. Blame the marginalized.
If you’ve looked at the results of the Selzer & Co Iowa poll, Kamala Harris is projected to win Iowa, but whether this poll is accurate or is a fluke remains to be seen (a recent Emerson poll has Trump ahead by 9 points in Iowa).
The point is that the attempt of the Harris campaign to court Republicans shouldn’t dampen enthusiasm among Progressives.
We need every vote. This isn’t capitulation. It’s strategy.
While we’re on the subject, progressives shouldn’t abstain from voting for Kamala Harris because of Gaza either.
Yes, Kamala Harris is basically a continuation of Biden’s policy on this issue, which hasn’t stopped the genocide. But Trump said in his debate with Biden that Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, should “finish the job” in Gaza as fast as possible. His solution to end the war is the annihilation of Palestinians, preferably before he takes office should he be elected. Kamala Harris wants to get hostages released and end the war through a two-state solution. So, this should be an easy choice.
I can’t explain it better than Bernie Sanders, so I’ll just put this here:
Note that these wobbles among Democrats should not significantly dampen enthusiasm for Kamala Harris. MAGA voters are saying that Kamala Harris is not popular, of course. They want undecided voters to believe that even Democrats think Kamala Harris is a noxious choice.
This is disingenuous.
Donald Trump is a danger to American democracy. Of course there is a focus on stopping him. But voters are enthusiastic for Kamala Harris. She is running on a campaign of decency and joy—and she is packing stadiums.
If Kamala Harris loses this election, it’s not because of her. It’s not because of anything she is, or did, or didn’t do. Kamala Harris is a qualified candidate who has run an extraordinary campaign.
Make no mistake.
If Kamala Harris loses, it is because more Americans wanted fascism than the rest of us feared losing democracy.
If Trump wins, it’s because people rejected information that doesn’t align with their beliefs. They feared themselves, their candidate, their religion, or America being “wrong” more than losing their freedom.
The cost will be our democracy.
Get out and vote.
PS: Even if Kamala Harris wins, Democrats are at high risk of losing the Senate. VOTE BLUE UP AND DOWN THE BALLOT.