Trump has a superpower that almost no one talks about --
which makes it even more powerful.

Someone who does talk about it is Ian Haney López, who wrote the book "Dog Whistle Politics"

where I learned about this strategy that has propelled Republicans into generations of political success.

It’s called
plausible deniability,which I think most people think of or discuss as “normalization.”

It’s the cloaking mechanism that makes all of Trump’s strategic division work,
including the birther’s one real innovation in dog-whistling:
the “triple move” that Haney López calls “racist theater.”

Here’s what Haney López told me recently:

So #dog #whistle #politics in the sixties, seventies, eighties, it was also regarded as morally suspect as tainted as cynical.

And so a lot of the strategy behind dog whistling politicians
--I think about Ronald Reagan talking about welfare queens and whatnot
--part of the strategy was to pretend that they weren't doing that at all
and to really push back against the press or any sort of suggestion that they were.

But that has shifted under Trump.

What Trump understands is that
if he can provoke the press, provoke the Democrats into calling him a racist,
that actually helps him because he is telling a #story to his #base in which they are not racist,
they are acting out of high principle,
they're trying to defend country and community and family.

But one of the core claims that's being made on the right is that demands for racial justice
demands for integration
demands for affirmative action
demands for diversity, equity, inclusion,
that those aren't actually animated by a sense of justice,
but rather they're motivated by a sense of revenge and a sense of hatred of white people.

And in this telling the right is constantly saying to white voters,
"People are racist against you.
They blame you for things that you weren't responsible for.
And they also think that you're racist just because you're white and that's racism against you."

In that context, Trump and J. D. Vance understand that there's this kind of complicated triple move that they can make.

They can say something outrageous:
“It's an invasion. They're poisoning the blood of the country.”
That's move number one.

Move number two, wait for people on the left to say,
"Hey, invasion and caravan and blood of the nation. That's racist language.”

And then they respond to that by saying, “I never mentioned race. I was just talking about immigrants.
I was just talking about protecting our country and securing our border.”

That's move number two.
“I didn't, no racism here, nothing to see here.”

And then comes move number three.
Then they go on to say,
“But, hey, wait a minute. You just accused me of racism.
And that's the real racism.
You're racist against me by thinking that I'm a racist, even though I'm just trying to protect the borders.

And you're not only racist against me, you're racist against all my supporters.”

So when this happens:

“Christians, get out and vote. Just this time,” he said at The Believers’ Summit,
an event hosted by the conservative advocacy group "Turning Point Action", in West Palm Beach, Fla.

“You won’t have to do it anymore, you know what? Four more years, it’ll be fixed, it’ll be fine, you won’t have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians.”

It triggers what we now have to call “Fascist Theater” in which the ️#plausible #deniability that’s gained from Trump’s constant blather, digressions, and weirdness serves him.️

https://i-know-how-much-you-care.ghost.io/trumps-superpower-is-plausible-deniability/