Even though Trump left office, he didn't leave the spotlight.
It seems hard to believe, but there was a time when we Americans could go days, or even weeks, without hearing about Donald Trump. That ended nearly a decade ago, when Trump decided he wanted to be president. Now, he is a constant presence on the evening news and in the morning newspaper. He ensures it by manufacturing turmoil, threats and constant controversy.
As Politico put it, he is "the ultimate attention seeker," plastering his name not only on buildings and golf courses but also on the nation's consciousness. And the news media accommodates him with free coverage, reporting thinly veiled threats of violence, complaints about mistreatment, gag-order violations and power naps in court. Even Trump's 11-car motorcade to the courthouse gets more press attention than what happens during President Biden's presidency.
Some of us wistfully remember the relative peace of the "No Drama Obama" presidency. Joe Biden is preternaturally calm compared to Trump, but calm doesn't get free media attention. Trump's manipulation of the media raises questions about fundamental fairness in an election year, but it also has a troubling impact on the American people.
Outside the MAGA camp, some Americans say they're suffering from crisis fatigue. Recent polls have found that voters from both parties anticipate the November election with a mixture of exhaustion and the realization that this is one of the most important elections ever.
Once Trump entered national politics, it didn't take long for him to raise society's anxiety level. In March 2017, The Oregonian reported, "President Trump isn't just dominating every news cycle, he's fueling therapy sessions across the country. … [T]he Trump administration's turbulent first two months appear to have created a collective angst, psychologists say."
Three months later, the New England Journal of Medicine reported that "a large proportion of U.S. adults are stressed by the current political environment." The doctors who authored the study also said that "two thirds of all adults surveyed said they were stressed about the future of the United States."
In 2017, TIME said, "Details of the new administration are prolific on news and social media, and Americans say it's stressing them out." By 2019, the Washington Post reported, "Donald Trump is stressing out America." In the fall of 2020, the Inquirer said, "Four years of Trump have left most Americans stressed." In 2021, author and Vox correspondent Anna North breathed a rhetorical sigh of relief that Trump's term was over. "Trump has finally left office," she wrote, "despite his constant threats that he wouldn't. But the impact on the American psyche of four years of racist rhetoric, incitement of violence, and out-and-out chaos remains."
But even though Trump left office, he didn't leave the spotlight. By 2023, an op-ed in The Hill stated, "With a former president facing four indictments and 91 criminal charges, our political institutions are under the greatest stress since the Civil War. … The result is a diminished American Dream."
Guardian commentator Margaret Sullivan questions whether the media has forgotten the lessons it should have learned during Trump's 2016 campaign, when he became "the great distractor … the shiny new toy that they (the media) couldn't take their eyes off." Analysts found that when the Republican primary elections were underway early in 2016, Trump received nearly $2 billion of free media attention and 63 percent of the campaign news coverage.
It's happening again because of Trump's trials. Rather than a repentant lawbreaker, the former president hardens the resolve of his supporters by posing as a martyr to the deep state. And with critical parts of the judicial system infected by partisanship, the rest of voters are unlikely to find out in time whether the Republican candidate for president is a felon. And whatever the outcome of the election, we can expect Trump to dominate the news with chaos again if he loses and by dismantling democracy if he wins.
Voters should ask themselves whether this is the future they want — and the future the nation can withstand. Or we can make America calm again by forcibly retiring Trump from politics to spend his days out of the spotlight, either in prison or back at Mar-a-Lago quietly improving his golf score.
William S. Becker is co-editor of and a contributor to “Democracy Unchained: How to Rebuild Government for the People,” and contributor to Democracy in a Hotter Time, named by the journal Nature as one of 2023’s five best science books. He previously served as a senior official in the Wisconsin Department of Justice. He is currently executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project (PCAP), a nonpartisan climate policy think tank unaffiliated with the White House.
