There’s a frightening reason for the wild and fear-mongering rhetoric that Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign frequently uses in its fundraising emails, according to historians.
Trump, with his rants about the United States under President Joe Biden and violent language about his perceived enemies, offers his supporters “salvation via donation” with the missives, said Federico Finchelstein, a professor of history at the New School for Social Research and Eugene Lang College in New York City in an article for Salon published on Monday.
“If fascism was a totalitarian ideology, movement and regime, Trumpism is that plus a personal business,” explained Finchelstein, the author of “A Brief History of Fascist Lies.” “The fascist identification between people, nation and leader mutates in Trumpism. It becomes not only a wannabe fascist project but also a business.”
Jennifer Mercieca, a historian of political rhetoric at Texas A&M University, told Salon that fascism’s goal is “to turn politics into warfare” by narrating “a world of chaos, corruption and hypocrisy,” which Trump does via his emails.
“Trump suffers for his followers, so his followers owe him. They owe him their loyalty, votes and money,” added the author of “Demagogue for President: The Rhetorical Genius of Donald Trump.” “Trump vows to continue to fight on, because his fight is really their fight. His followers should stand with him and give him power so he can keep fighting for them.”
Trump’s very first fundraising email was sent in June 2016, just five months before his shock election victory over Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.
Titled “The First One,” it struck a much more conservative tone than the unhinged communications that now target Trump supporters in 2023.
Back then, the then-presidential candidate just asked for between $1 and $2,700 donations — and promised to match up to $2 million in contributions.
Trump has since resorted to fundraising off pretty much anything and everything that makes the news. In August, he even raised cash via his own snarling mug shot that was taken following his arrest for allegedly trying to subvert the 2020 election result in Georgia.
On Sunday, the Trump campaign reported third-quarter receipts of $24.5 million to the Federal Election Commission. The Biden campaign, meanwhile, raised $71 million in the same time frame.
Despite his four indictments and multiple looming trials, Trump remains the GOP’s clear front-runner with around 58% support, meaning a replay of the Biden-Trump 2020 election remains on the cards.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is polling second in the Republican race at 12% and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley is third at 7%.