The Method to Trump’s Mendacity
A Sensible Strategy for Fighting Donald Trump’s Most Dangerous Lies
Welcome to the Civic Way journal, our quick take on the relevance of current events to America’s future governance. The author, Bob Melville, is the founder of Civic Way, a nonprofit dedicated to good government, and a management consultant with over 45 years of experience improving public agencies.
Lies have always been regarded as justifiable tools in political dealings. – Hannah Arendt
Introduction
Most of us believe that deception is wrong. We learned early that honesty is the best policy, that we should never tell a lie. We value honesty as one of the building blocks of good character. Even when we are skeptical about our politicians, we expect them to pay a price for deception.
Still, to error is human. Even the best among us tells the occasional lie, perhaps to protect others or conceal our missteps. Some hide the truth. Others exaggerate or embellish. At some point, we fall prey to deception (or self-deception). Exploit the gullible or trust the unscrupulous. Weave a touching story about ourselves or loved ones. Most of us learn and grow from our mistakes.
Perhaps that is why so many of us are frozen by the powerful mendacity of Donald Trump. It effortlessly blends lying with bullshitting[i] and on an unprecedented scale. It is relentless and exhausting. That Trump excels at mendacity is no longer at issue. Nor is the odor of that mendacity. What matters even more is Trump’s end game.
Lying in Politics
In her 1971 essay, “Lying in Politics,” Hannah Arendt wrote, “Lies are often … more plausible … than reality, since the liar has the great advantage of knowing beforehand what the audience wishes … to hear.” Moreover, she viewed the abilities to lie and act as “interconnected.” Deception is a tempting way to maintain electoral support or get things done (or evade scrutiny).
Most of us believe that, at some point, politicians—even those we like—employ deception at some level. Like investors who understand how stock prices reflect risk, most voters grasp that politicians aren’t always entirely truthful. We accept, for example, that presidents lie, if not to cover up domestic blunders, to justify war or keep foreign adversaries off balance.
America’s recent political history is replete with periodic presidential deception. LBJ’s Gulf of Tonkin resolution to escalate the Vietnam War. Nixon’s Watergate denials. George W. Bush’s 2003 weapons of mass destruction (WMD) claims to justify the Iraqi War. Bill Clinton’s initial sexual misconduct denials. Before Trump, political lying carried risk; a politician caught in a lie usually suffered consequences.
The Firehose of Falsehood Strategy
Unlike the long list of presidents for whom lying was the exception, Trump made it the rule. During his first term, he lied about everything from the pandemic to crowd size. And the volume was stunning, reportedly over 30,000 falsehoods over four years (an average of 21 per day[ii]).
After Trump’s 2020 loss, his lying, conniving and bullshitting became more desperate. His election lies were the most damaging, but others followed. Spewing bullshit such as “I have the best words,” “I am a very stable genius” or “I know more about (pick a topic[iii]) than anyone.” Dismissing inconvenient facts or unfavorable reports as “fake news”. Convincing some that he would “Make America Great Again.”
In the run up to the 2024 election, Trump’s lying and bullshitting proliferated. Making empty promises to save the economy, balance the budget, rebuild infrastructure, improve healthcare and appoint qualified managers. Denying knowledge of Project 2025. Dismissing climate change as a hoax. Announcing “I alone can fix it.” Characterizing his narrow electoral win as a historic “landslide.”
In the first year of its second term, Trump’s lies, boasts and broken promises have been interminable. Bragging about ending wars. Musing about running the world. Vilifying immigrants as criminals and transexuals as an existential threat. Boasting of transforming the economy from the “worst” to the “best and defeating inflation (while simultaneously calling it a hoax).
Trump adapted his cavalcade of deceptions into what a former aide called the “firehose of falsehood” strategy. Instead of merely distracting voters, he sought to anesthetize them. As Arendt once wrote, the goal of such lying is disorientation not persuasion. When democracy is on life support, drowning facts with lies is equivalent to pulling the plug. The sheer volume eases our descent into autocracy.
Distinguishing the Dangerous Lies
Trump has largely succeeded in creating a thick fog of deception. Sometimes lost in that cloud is that some lies pose a perilous threat to America and the world. Let’s consider some of the most dangerous.
America First – This one is about putting Trump first. It relies on ruse to test Trump’s ability to dominate other nations. National security (Greenland). Drug control (Venezuela). Bringing manufacturing home (tariffs).
Immigration – This lie is about exerting domestic power, not deporting criminals. Attacking opponents as “radical leftists” to justify unleashing ill-trained federal militia on our streets and empowering Trump to run the US as he sees fit.
Law and order – “Draining the swamp” was a cute slogan, but it masked Trump’s true intentions. Casting judges and prosecutors as corrupt made it easier to grant dubious pardons, pursue shady deals, enrich himself and bury the Epstein files.
Economic prosperity – Instead of economic prosperity, lower prices and plentiful jobs, Trump has undermined capitalism, incurred crippling debt, rewarded billionaires with tax breaks, raised healthcare insurance premiums and left working people to fare for themselves.
Election integrity – Trump denied his 2020 loss and incited an insurrection. Rewriting history and discrediting election processes divides the nation, destabilizes democracy and sets the table for suspending future elections.
This is not to suggest that the countless other lies don’t matter—such lying in our political leaders is intolerable. It is to assert, however, that Trump’s deceits are a means to a far more perilous end.
The Stubborn Resilience of Truth
In the face of Trump’s ceaseless torrent of lies, there is some reason for hope. Arendt argued that a lie’s success cannot be indefinitely decoupled from the truth that it conceals. She wrote[iv], “truth … possesses an ineradicable primacy over all falsehoods,” adding that the deceiver ultimately “loses all contact with … the real world, which still will catch up with him” and “the whole operation of deception, no matter how well organized or sophisticated, will run aground...” Perhaps.
Arendt was right about the disorienting effect of torrential political lying. Until Trump arrived on the scene, our nation had never seen a president or presidential candidate so reflexively deceptive. Most Americans—including many Trump voters—downplay his claims or ignore them altogether. However, since 2016, far fewer Americans follow the news closely[v]. This may not be Trump’s fault, but it portends a growing disorientation that threatens democracy.
Unfortunately, Arendt may have been too optimistic. She did not live to see the many developments so useful to liars in 21st century America—like technology, fake news and dark money. She could not fully foresee the rise of an American political movement based solely on ignorance, self-deception and rage. She could not fully envision a president who normalized lying to tarnish institutions, belittle governance and dilute accountability.
What if the deceptions overpower facts? What if the lying works as intended, to chill independent thought? Arendt wrote that a deceived people—especially those for whom fact and fiction are blurred—are the ideal subjects for authoritarians. Without the power to think and judge, they will follow blindly. Trump is counting on it.
A New Counter-Mendacity Strategy
Trump is no ordinary politician. Devoid of any empathy or moral code, he has industrialized deception and chicanery. It is his political superpower. Trump’s breathtaking impulse for deceit—and assault on truth, decency and democracy—calls for an entirely new strategy.
First, we must focus on fighting the worst of his lies, not all of them. To save our country, we must stop trying to prove what is already well established. Instead, we must anticipate and frustrate the ultimate goal of Trump’s firehose of falsehoods—to replace democracy with autocracy. At the very least, we must fight for the principles upon which America was founded.
Second, our resistance must be, in the words of William Kristol, “clear-eyed and unintimidated.” Like the Federal Reserve chair or the leaders of our former European allies, we must stop placating the bully. Like a bully (or mob boss), Trump sees compromise as capitulation and an invitation to boost his demands. Instead, let us pierce Trump’s lies and join Minnesotans in their valiant struggle for America.