Donald Trump will be president again. No doubt. It is something that, like everything in politics, is neither good nor bad, but simply is. It happens, period. Because, as politics is articulated in factions, whether right or left, Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labor, what seems good to some will always seem bad to others. In addition, it is cyclical, since sooner or later the tables turn.
But, when we say that Trump will be president again, we are not necessarily referring to the tycoon getting out of prison and physically re-occupying the White House, but rather his political figure, everything that represents his ideology and his way of understanding the functioning of a society and the world, it will return to the forefront. In fact, he never left and every day he is stronger. In the United States, the latest clearest example is that of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., another of the Kennedys who has launched a presidential campaign and who, despite being a Democrat, has a speech with Republican overtones. And it is that Trumpism is already everywhere. It is a trend or, rather, a trending topic.
In fact, there are already other Trumps who govern in his image and likeness in other countries. We see, without going any further, how ultra populism is increasingly present in Europe and increasingly occupying more governments, whether national or regional. We see it in Hungary, in Poland, in Italy, in Finland, in the great boom that it shows in France, it is also rising in Germany or in Spain, where the next 23-J will experience a new chapter on how this advance of Trumpism continues.
In reality, Trump’s politics has already taken over the Spanish one, as if we had already assimilated and normalized it, just like we did with Hollywood movies or McDonald’s hamburgers. Today, rallies are no longer carried, but messages on social networks and, in these general elections, the interviews of the candidates in programs like El Hormiguero, where Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo are no longer disputing votes , but the audiences and the image (the style) that they offer in front of the viewers. In other words, it no longer matters what electoral program they have, but rather what television program they go to. It is no longer necessary for them to debate face to face with each other, but each one of them through the mediation of Ana Rosa Quintana, Pablo Motos or Jordi Évole. It is the trumpization of politics.
You might think that the most Trumpist parties in Spain are the PP and Vox, although, in reality, everyone is joining this game in their own way. Feijóo will surely dissolve like a sugar cube, as happened to Pablo Casado, if he does not get the presidency. Isabel Díaz Ayuso, with a more Trumpist profile, has all the numbers to establish herself as the Spanish Trump, just as the Italians already have Giorgia Meloni.
Since the first televised debate was organized in the 20th century, politics (or the way voters are addressed) has changed. But, now, it is the reality television presenters who are setting themselves up as a kind of medium between the candidates and the voters, increasingly distanced from the politicians. More than convincing the voter, it is necessary to invoke it, as in a seance through the televisions.
This, however, is not new, it is simply Trumpist. Trump has been involved in the World Wrestling Federation / Entertainment world of professional wrestling since the late 1980s. And it turns out that Linda McMahon, co-founder and former CEO of WWE, later worked on her election campaigns. Trump continued to gain fame and seduce more and more Americans thanks to his television shows, such as The Apprentice, a reality show in which he played the role of a powerful chief executive and contestants competed to obtain a year working at The Trump Organization. The contestant who was not suitable, Trump himself would eliminate him with his famous phrase: “You’re fired” (“You are fired”). Later, he was also a presenter of The Celebrity Apprentice, with the participation of celebrities.
But, Trump’s presidential run was also forged by his cameo appearances in various movies. Also, he had his own radio slot, Trumped! He even got to sing with Megan Mullally at the 57th edition of the Emmy Awards in 2005. While here Sánchez and Feijóo compete for Pablo Motos, Trump was invited up to 24 times on the Howard Stern Show. And where he finished cementing his candidacy for the White House was as a commentator for Fox
This is how the spirit of Trumpism is more present than ever in Spain in this electoral campaign of 23-J. It is not only noticeable in the (pseudo) speeches of the candidates, in the level of their language, but in the political strategies of the headquarters of each party that bet more on reality television than on the reality of the problems of the Spanish. It is not that Artificial Intelligence has taken over politics, but that it is Donald Trump who already governs us. He is omnipresent. Yes, he will be president again. And that’s not good or bad, it just is. And, if he doesn’t like it, he already knows what awaits him: “You’re fired”.
