For those who, three years after Donald Trump came to power, are wondering about the foundations of "Trumpism", the President of the United States' management of the coronavirus pandemic could provide some answers. Between denial of reality, search for a scapegoat, omnipresence in the media, ousting of discordant voices, political approach, isolationism and short-term vision vis-à-vis the greatest health challenge of recent decades, Mr. Trump has, during the weeks past, given to see some of the aspects that have shaped his presidency since January 2017.
A mandate which confirmed what politicians and historians foresaw when he came to power: Trumpism is not just an ideology or a philosophy. However, a mode of governance emerged, marked by the extreme polarization of American society: "Donald Trump rules with a mixture of neoconservatism and far-right politics, using strongly nationalist, populist and authoritarian language", explains Cas Mudde, Dutch political scientist specializing in populism, author of The Far Right Today (Polity Press, 2019, untranslated). Trumpism is also unique in that it has installed at the highest level of the state a "Rejection of standards", considered hitherto the standard of democratic rules in the United States, said Sheri Berman, a political scientist specializing in the history of social democracy and a professor at Columbia University.
16,241 false lies or claims
So Mr. Trump's tenuous connection to the truth, as well as his disregard for facts and science, is well established. On the third anniversary of his coming to power, on January 20, the American president had stated 16,241 false lies or statements, according to a dizzying tally of the Washington Post. Even on a subject as essential as the health of his fellow citizens, he played on his ability to twist the facts: the Covid-19 will "Disappear, like a miracle", he trumpeted on February 27; "We will have a vaccine very soon", he said, March 2, when all the experts are counting on research that can take at least a year. "All Americans can get tested", he assured, on March 7, before affirming on the 15th that, "Faced with this highly contagious virus, the situation (was) under control ". The United States was already counting their deaths. They have since become the epicenter of the pandemic.
