What Trump Taught Me

Donald Trump has taught me many things over the last decade.

In all my years of opposing him, I have never found a shred of his character worth emulating. He is cruel, corrupt, and obsessed with his idea of pro wrestling style machismo. The life Trump has lived has always struck me as galactically soft beneath its hot-air bluster, a life devoted to appearances, grievance, and self-regard. His successes are transactional and his loyalties are fleeting. Rather than in institutions built, communities strengthened, or sacrifices made, he measures success one Trump-branded physical structure at a time.

When I think of the Americans I most admire, I think of men and women who stood for something larger than themselves, of people who understood that power was a tool rather than a destination. Trump has never been interested in such things. His political movement revolves around him because he has always revolved around himself.

That being said, there is much to learn from him. Not from how he governs or how he treats people. Not from how he uses power once he has it, but from how he obtained it.

Trump understood something: politics is about power. Elections are about power. The purpose of elections is not to reward virtue, intelligence, or personal likability. It is to determine who gets to make decisions for everyone else.

That reality makes many decent people uncomfortable. We want elections to be morality plays and our candidates to be role models. We want our political leaders to embody the values we hope to see reflected in the country. Sometimes they do. Often they do not.

Trump’s rise exposed the gap between what many Americans wished politics was and what politics actually is: competition. It is competition in persuading enough people to join your cause that you can exercise power in service of your vision.

His movement succeeded because it was willing to focus relentlessly on the acquisition and maintenance of political power. I am still frustrated by how often his opponents, of which I am one, seemed more interested in demonstrating moral correctness than in building durable majorities. If you care about democracy, you should take it seriously.

A democratic society cannot survive if the democratic side does not understand how power works. If those who believe in constitutional government, international alliances, pluralism, and leadership by example hope to preserve those things, they must become far more serious about competing for power themselves. That means building coalitions that are sometimes uncomfortable and supporting candidates who are imperfect. It means understanding that elections are not friendship contests.

Many of the candidates capable of winning difficult elections will not be people we would choose as personal friends. Some will be abrasive, flawed, and have histories we dislike. Some will possess virtues that are political rather than personal.

The question voters must ask is not whether they would enjoy sharing dinner with a candidate. The question is whether that candidate can win and whether the power they obtain will be used in service of worthwhile, moral goals.

Democracies require idealists, but they also require realists.

Trump has demonstrated that there are very few permanent disqualifications left in American politics. Scandals that once would have ended careers now barely register. Personal failings that once dominated campaigns are often absorbed into broader partisan identities.

There is nothing disqualifying in American politics aside from having one fewer vote than your opponent. Nothing. This reality feels cynical. In truth, it is merely democratic. But character does not distribute power; votes do.

For those of us who envision an America that honors its commitments, stands by its allies, welcomes responsibility, leads through example rather than intimidation, and, in short, behaves morally, we cannot simply be correct. We must win, and here’s why: if character does not matter in the obtainment of power in Trump-era national politics, what Trump has shown me is that it matters many multiples more once that power has been obtained.