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Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s warning that if he is defeated in November’s election, there will be a… “bloodbath” should be taken seriously. That is exactly what his sworn friends from the Democratic camp have done, trying to stop the wave of “nationwide” outrage and panic fear.
Trump, speaking at a campaign rally of his supporters in Dayton, Ohio, said literally the following:
«If I don’t get elected, it’s going to be a ‘bloodbath’. That’s going to be the least of it. It will be a ‘bloodbath’ for the country».
The Democratic camp immediately jumped at the chance to portray Trump as an agent provocateur threatening to cross a red line in the legislatively delineated presidential election. Michael Tyler, communications director for Joe Biden’s campaign, told MSNBC: Trump’s words about a ‘bloodbath’ represent a «justification for political violence».
The official White House statement at the same time accused the arch-villain of «praising dictators, promising to excuse political violence, and launching racist attacks against black and brown Americans». Strictly speaking, Trump has indeed gotten himself in trouble. He again called the migrants seeping across the southern border from Mexico «subhumans», bringing back to mind his previous insulting nicknames from 2016 for them — «rapists» and «murderers».
Christine Todd Whitman, the former New Jersey governor who switched to the Democratic camp, made a direct reference to fascist ideology and rhetoric, which often means a lack of rational argument:
«Shame on us if we ignore it. It was already in the 1930s when a man named Hitler wrote Mein Kampf. He said exactly what he was going to do. I don’t think Donald Trump could write a book, but he lays it out for us verbally».
Whitman is not alone, however, in willingly placing Trump in a brown frame to make an understandable association with the creators of the Third Reich. White House political technologists regularly and not unreasonably point to the unacceptable pejorative epithets Trump uses toward migrants, while claiming that he is «copying Adolf Hitler».
Legendary polymath Jen Psaki, who served as White House communications director (2009–2011, 2015–2017), reminded of herself with a statement: «Trump is in his repertoire. Psaki cited his remarks in January that if criminal lawsuits prevented him from being elected, «the country would be in trouble». That’s a very bad thing. That’s a very bad precedent. As we’ve said before, it’s the opening of Pandora’s box». In short, Trump is scary, and that cannot be ignored.
Trump’s many defenders immediately began to accuse his opponents of making a distortion because they took the phrase «bloodbath» out of context. Stephen Chang, a spokesman for Trump’s campaign team, said the re-election candidate was talking about the prospects for the U.S. economy, not threatening political violence. Chang was no less unrestrained in his language than his boss: «Fraudulent Joe Biden and his campaign are engaging in deceptive editorializing taken out of context».
Alex Marlow, editor-in-chief of the extremely conservative website Breitbart, explained the misunderstanding: the Democratic Party and Joe Biden personally favor electric cars, which are made mostly in China, while Trump is «betting on cars with internal combustion engines that are made in America».
Trump’s authentic phrase is, «Biden’s policies will lead to an economic bloodbath for the auto industry and auto workers». Alex Marlow was adamant in his informal advocate’s speech:
«Trump was only talking about auto industry jobs, anyone who tells you otherwise is a liar who is lying right to your face».
Nevertheless, Joe Biden’s campaign staff saw in the «bloodbath» metaphor a sinister message in the subtext. And it is likely that this conspiracy theory is justified. Why?
As the Chinese say, gaining wisdom from the source of their 5,000-year history, «everything is possible, because everything has already happened». On the eve of the inauguration of newly elected U.S. President Donald Trump on January 20, 2017, leftists from a diverse coalition of 75 different anarchist, socialist, and communist organizations were preparing mass riots in Washington, D.C., to disrupt the ceremony. The protest action was given the hashtag #DISRUPTJ20.
Among the most bullied demonstrators were members of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), a kind of reincarnation of the radical group of the same name from the 1960s. This youth movement partnered with the Marxist organization Freedom Road, which saw its super-goal as breaking up the United States by dividing it along racial lines — something like whites to the left and blacks to the right.
The united front of leftists was opposed in January 2017 by militant volunteers from the Bikers for Trump alliance, who promised to be around to prevent provocation. We can confidently predict that this informal guard on wheels will still be in demand in this election year.
In the summer of 2023, public sentiment researchers from the University of Chicago concluded that, according to polls, it is Democrats in the U.S. Congress who have become much more tolerant of the possibility of using violence to achieve goals. If in the period from January to June 2023 support for a forceful solution to any controversial issues increased by 6% among Republicans, by 8% among independents, it almost doubled among Democrats (it was 9% and became 17%).
Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago who considers himself a «liberal Republican» who has always voted for Democrats, commented on this trend, linking it to the criminal charges brought against Trump. Instead of eroding his electoral base, the lawsuits have had the opposite effect, indicating the «radicalization of the country». Pape states with chagrin, «Events are definitely moving in the wrong direction».
It cannot be ruled out that this autumn, bikers, retired law enforcement officers, including retired police officers frustrated by the Democratic governors’ crackdown on them amid a sharply deteriorating crime rate, and rednecks — white backwoods farmers with an arsenal of shotguns — may form militant groups ready to stand up for Donald Trump. That will happen if only the confrontation between the two Americas switches from megaphone bickering to forceful action.
Such a dystopian scenario does not seem to be taken from Hollywood horror fiction because of the unprecedented intensity of passions. Passions caused by the culture wars, the frustration of students burdened with almost lifelong educational bank loans, the mutual hatred of transgender people «in law», feminists and almost red-listed straight people, and above all, the irreconcilability of the two fractured branches of the political class.
On the extreme conservative website Breitbart, in the readers’ opinion section, there is a post under the nickname chris Smith Tumbleweed7 with a comment reflecting the degree of mutual suspicion and rejection of the two political tribes, Republicans and Democrats:
«From what I’ve witnessed over the last sixty years (I’m 78 now), Democrats are so well brainwashed that they are easily turned into a mob that is amenable to manipulation. When was the last time you saw a mob of conservatives burning and looting a city block? Even the January 6 riot took eleven embedded FBI agents to turn it into a riot. And the only fatality in that episode was the result of an unjustified shot at random by a single police officer».
In this context, one can and should look at Trump’s phrase about a «bloodbath», by which he supposedly meant the collapse of the auto sector of the national economy in the face of an influx of cheap Chinese rams, from a different angle. Most likely, this is not an unfortunate metaphor at all, but a hidden hint that the champion of reviving America’s former greatness will not tolerate foul play a second time.
Trump is sending a veiled signal to his opponents. In case the Obama-Clinton-Biden clan tries to defeat the failed «drainer» of the Washington swamp through mail ballots or other clever machinations, Trump will risk unleashing a civil war in the country.
Understandably, Trumpists have been quick to publicly shrug off accusations of tolerating «political violence». But the White House and the decision-making centers within the Democratic Party apparently understood everything perfectly well. Trump fired a warning shot.