Tonight’s debate will likely be yet another example of how the election season may seem to be proceeding normally, with caucuses, conventions, debates and more, but the meaning and purpose of these traditions has been changed by the Republican exit from democratic political culture and Trump’s authoritarian profile.
Put differently, this “debate” may look familiar in the context of the history of American democracy, but the intent of one of the participants will be informed by autocratic goals: to spread lies to Americans, cultivate more people for his violent agendas, smear and delegitimize Biden (Trump will likely also try and rattle the sometimes irascible Biden by going after his family), and expand on his brand of strongman invincibility.
He will likely also evoke the “upside-down world of authoritarianism,” as I call it, presenting himself as a force for peace in the world because he has the ear of autocrats (or so he wants people to believe), and associating Biden with tyranny and corruption.
Trump is a skilled and seasoned performer and can conjure a false reality convincingly. He also knows how to use his physical presence in threatening ways. Who can forget his shadowing of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 debate? And his attempt to turn his body into an instrument of biowarfare by attending a 2020 debate with Biden while secretly sick with Covid?
The absence of live fact-checking by the moderators, which would have confronted Trump with his lies in real time, will work to his advantage if the debate is seen in information warfare terms. It will allow him to spread his propaganda, unchecked, to a giant bipartisan audience. (Stalwart CNN reporter Daniel Dale will be providing live fact-checking on the CNN website, but relatively few viewers will be following that).
“Debates among presidential candidates enact the democratic principle of mutual tolerance: the notion that those who don't share your political views have a right to free expression,” I wrote in a 2023 piece on how demagogues don’t care for debates (Putin and Orban no longer participate in them). “The public hears an exchange of views by individuals who are on equal footing and bound by rules which are enforced by an impartial arbiter.”
“This is anathema to the authoritarian mindset. Personality cults posit the leader as a man above all others, and the egalitarian staging and format of debates make them dangerous to his brand. Moreover, authoritarians who depend on disinformation, threat, and corruption (including fixing elections), have much to lose by submitting to spontaneous questioning by a rival or a third party.”
Given this, I was unsure if Trump would participate, until I thought about the advantage he would have with no on-stage pushback to his falsehoods about Biden and about himself. He is also desperate, with his felony conviction and the recent bad press about his economic plans, to convince more people to vote for him.
Above all, the information warrior never gives up a chance to conquer new hearts and minds, and Trump is nothing if not tenacious.
So keep this in mind if you are watching: the form may look familiar, but the content and approach of the Republican participant is dictated by goals that are anathema to democracy.
By now everybody with a functional mind knows how he uses asymmetrical warfare on the polity. CNN who wants to go more Right, may think this is a smart move for Trump access, but they are no longer acting like the Fourth Estate.
Thank you Ruth!
Biden will handle it!
Vote Blue in November!