At regular intervals since the late 1980s, the American press asked Donald Trump when he would decide to run in the presidential election. Each time, the businessman and reality TV star gave the same answer: It’s not the right time. When, on June 16, 2015, he finally announced his candidacy, it was met with widespread laughter. Polls ranked him dead last, even within his own party in potential primaries, where he was seen as a clown. He called politicians fools, journalists idiots and Mexicans “rapists,” and referred to America as a “dumping ground.” The rest is well known.
This patient insight in choosing the right moment and the style suited to the situation should have been enough to settle the matter: No, Donald Trump is not “crazy.” Besides being offensive to those with mental illness, this well-worn accusation carries a major risk. Considering Trump as mentally ill both exonerates him and sets him apart as an exception, stripping the political content from a carefully planned takeover, which began with his rapprochement in 2009 with the Tea Party, evangelicals, Steve Bannon and veteran Republican Newt Gingrich, whose pamphlet Language: A Key Mechanism of Control (1990) lists “positive” and “negative” words to use for “effective” speeches. Trump’s entire vocabulary can be found there, from “common sense” to “pathetic.”
Not only is Trump not crazy, but he is dangerous because, after the trial run of a first chaotic and erratic presidency, he now has a well-constructed agenda. That policy platform is available in the 900 pages of Project 2025, published by the Heritage Foundation, an ultraconservative and climate-skeptic think tank that called Trump a “clown” in 2016.
Everything is there, starting with the government’s takeover of the Department of Justice and the FBI, dismantling the Department of Education, drastically reducing the number of federal employees, ending programs to fight discrimination against minorities, mass deportation of undocumented immigrants and withdrawing the US from medical aid programs abroad, among others. These were all proposals enacted as soon as Trump came to power. Yet, during his campaign, he had taken care to distance himself from Project 2025, claiming to have “no idea” who was behind it after the July 2, 2024 statement from its president, Kevin Roberts – a statement to be taken literally: “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.” Minneapolis, through the courage of its citizens, has begun to respond to this grim prophecy.
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