With the news avalanche that is Trump, it’s hard to keep track of all the outrageous things he says and does. With his recent very vocal attempts at land grabs (that we are not entirely sure will stay rhetorical) that are already being normalized in both right-wing and mainstream media, it’s important to look back at what is at the heart of Trump’s political philosophy that he himself doesn’t realize.

Breaking Point

Carnival is hardly the term that comes up often in foreign policy, but Mikhail Bakhtin has helped understand the mechanism of populism. Carnival is about norm-breaking and perceived reversal of the hierarchy, where “real people” take the power from the “corrupt elite” (sound familiar?). It’s about gorging yourself and laughing at everything. Bharath Ganesh and I argue in our book “The Trump Carnival: Populism, Transgression and the Far-Right” that one of the hallmarks of the Trump phenomenon is the legitimation of transgression: transgression in itself becomes a value. Trumps’ “populism” boils down to its transgressive aspect: both its articulation of taboos, put in place by an elite, and encouraging their violation. But what matters is *what* Trump violates, which also reveals what kind of populist he is. The Trump carnival is fundamentally anti-democratic; as its carnival fool, Trump’s transgressions—taking pride in grabbing women and mocking political correctness—are an invitation for others to do the same. The Trump carnival is about the collective violation of democracy itself. It is about taking joy in the violation of claims to equality and representation, by a group of people who mythologize themselves as victims because they no longer have dominance over others.

At least two instances of the Trump news cycle in his first presidential campaign were “believe them when they tell you who they are” moments: the infamous “Access Hollywood” tape and his almost prophetic statement about shooting somebody in the middle of Fifth Avenue and not losing any voters. Both were ominous of what was yet to come of the Trump presidency: assault on women’s rights and assault on the Capitol. In Trump 1.0 the carnivalesque transgression against democratic norms was obvious: Trump consistently sided and defended white supremacists, insulted his critics, refused to disclose his taxes or health records and all in the name of ephemeral “real Americans”. Back in 2018 I already wrote that the extended carnival and norm-breaking would be detrimental to the American republic. So far it’s already true: a felon and insurrectionist is about to be inaugurated and at least one of these features directly contradicts the founding fathers’ designs.

Breaking Bad

Once Trump lost the elections in 2020, his supporters engaged in the ultimate carnivalesque act of reclaiming the power that they thought was taken away from them. By claiming that the elections were rigged, even ahead of his own 2016 win, Trump eroded his public’s trust in this democratic institution. Hence, the storming of the Capitol in January 2021: while Trump may have thought that he could hold on to power by instigating the insurrection, material from the January 6 Commission shows a significant number of people believed they had the right to transgress: to break down doors, windows, defecate in public, steal, declare that 6 million dead Jews were not enough, and wear horned fur hats in the chambers. Transgression becomes cool, a mark of accomplishment, a feature of “winning” and “owning the libs” who are stupid enough to follow all those rules. The fact that Trump’s indictments haven’t affected his approval rating (if anything, they have had a positive effect) shows that transgression perpetrated by those in power is completely legitimized.

In Trump 2.0, with a circle of sycophants around him (no more “adults in the room”) and the chorus of brown(nosing) media magnates, there seems to be the expansion of transgression to the  foreign policy domain as well. We already know that Trump doesn’t care about norms, and seeing how transgression has paid off in the domestic sphere, why not turn to foreign policy? After all, there is a lot of evidence of Trump being bored with the minutiae of presidential job and seeming to enjoy the foreign policy pomp with adulating dictators on his side. If he is allowed to violate the rules at home, why not abroad? After all, it will not be that far from previous American foreign policy norm violations (cough, Iraq, cough). Seeing how Putin can invade a neighboring country (which, by the way, several people in Trump’s orbit, including JD Vance and Tucker Carlson, think is a part of Russian ancestral lands), it’s natural for Trump to assume that “when you are a celebrity they let you do that”.

All of this to say, if I were Canada, I would be worried. 

*Crossposted from POP – Political Observatory on Populism blog with slight changes.