On 21st March 2023 Trump launched his first Facebook advertising campaign since he left office and four days later he held his first major rally of the year in Waco, Texas.
Trump’s 2024 primary campaign has stepped up a gear and the narrative that he will deploy is now becoming clear.
Trump is running an “outsider” narrative. It’s the narrative that won him the 2016 Republican US Presidential Primary and it’s the one that he seems most at home delivering.
“How can a former US President possibly position himself as an outsider?” you might reasonably ask.
To have something to rub against, Trump has created a bogeyman, the Deep State, which holds back ordinary Americans.
In Trump’s narrative he is the only candidate with the guts and strength to stand up to the Deep State.
Trump’s character in this narrative is a rebel with a cause. He’s refusing to accept the diktats of the establishment overlords and is calling on his supporters to revolt.
The Deep State is an amorphous body that manipulates the laws of the land to favour the elites and inflicts injustice on the people.
Trump is on the side of natural justice for regular citizens, which brings him and his followers into conflict with the Deep State.
Trump’s narrative is archetypal and speaks to the fundamental human need to improve one’s situation. Trump’s narrative is the same narrative that appears frequently in great works of fiction and it is adept at getting people to empathise with a rebel character.
For example, in the story of Robin Hood, when The Sheriff of Nottingham is imposing unfair laws on the common folk, we are on the side of Robin when he leads an uprising.
Similarly in the original Star Wars movies, The Galactic Empire upholds the rules of the regime, but they are oppressive, so we cheer for Hans Solo when he seeks to break them.
In Trump’s narrative, Joe Biden and the Democratic Party are (of course) on the side of the Deep State. But so too are the “fake news” media, the legal system and any person or organisation which dares to cross Trump.
Establishment Republicans are agents of the Deep State too. Jeb Bush, Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney and John McCain – all adversaries of Trump and standard bearers of a more moderate conservatism – are painted by Trump as being part of the Deep State conspiracy.
Trump portrays them as Republicans who pay phoney lip service to conservative values but are really in cahoots with the enemies of the people.
Trump is beginning to position the man who will likely be Trump’s main competition, Ron DeSantis, as being an establishment Republican and therefore on the side of the Deep State.
For example, Trump’s campaign released a video that showed DeSantis using similar language as Romney and McCain to describe Russia.
In another clip shared by the Trump campaign Twitter feed, Ron DeSantis’ campaign is accused of being run by “The Bushes”.
Trump’s nickname for his opponent is Ron DeSanctimonious. This is another way of depositioning DeSantis as being on the side of the Deep State. To be sanctimonious is to make a show of being morally superior to other people. When Trump is calling his opponent sanctimonious he is accusing him of behaving in an ostentatious way that attempts to curry favour with the elites that are allied with the Deep State.
The timing and location of Trump’s rally was chosen as a way of reinforcing Trump’s ‘outsider’ narrative. The rally was on the 30 year anniversary of a 51-day standoff and deadly siege between law enforcement and a rebellious religious movement in Waco.
Trump opened the rally by playing a song featuring a choir of people that were put in jail for taking part in the insurrection that took place on 6th January 2020. It played like an anthem to rebellion and landed Trump’s narrative perfectly.
Trump’s narrative is so tight that it can be condensed down to a single sound bite which the candidate is repeating over and over again: “In reality, they’re not after me, they’re after you, I’m just standing in their way.”
But the narrative is also broad enough to allow him to set his targets on everyone from Stormy Daniels, to Joe Biden, Ron DeSantis, CNN and more.
If Trump can effectively seed the notion that the Deep State is responsible for poisoning his Presidency and ejecting him from office, and that the same forces are now seeking to prevent his reelection, it will be very persuasive to lots of voters who want to deliver change.
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Thanks for this perceptive analysis of Trump’s narrative for his campaign to win the Republican Primary. Hopefully his party competitors and the Democratic opposition who read it will be better prepared. They need to be as it’s brilliant example of the ‘Outsider’ positioning:
“In reality, they’re not after me, they’re after you, I’m just standing in their way.”