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AZProgressive

(29,698 posts)
Wed Jun 18, 2025, 10:19 AM Jun 18

Will Trump's Disinformation Presidency Lead to Civil War?

(snip)

His 2024 presidential endeavor was more a propaganda operation than a political campaign. He claimed Haitian immigrants were eating cats and dogs, Venezuelan criminal migrants had taken control of towns across the Midwest, schools were performing gender transition operations on children without informing parents, and Biden and Vice President Harris were purposefully importing millions of undocumented people (and using a phone app that told cartel heads where to drop off these migrants). He spewed outrageous and outlandish lies to support an unfounded narrative: America was apocalyptic.

This was both madness and method. The goal of disinformation is to shape perceptions. If Trump could convince voters that they were imperiled by mobs of barbarous pet-eating brown people and that Biden and Harris were in cahoots with savages and marauders, then they’d have little choice but to vote for him. He was selling a fictitious script to incite fear and loathing, believing that would win him support.

Trump is not facing an election now, but he is continuing to use scare tactics to skew reality. Since he returned to the White House, he has cited phony emergencies to abuse presidential power, falsely claiming that the entry of undocumented people into the United States amounts to an invasion waged by a foreign power and that trade deficits threaten the survival of the nation. And in response to the protests in Los Angeles against his cruel mass deportation effort, he has turned his disinformation campaign up to 11.

Trump says these demonstrations—which have been mostly peaceful, with some yielding limited violent actions—are an insurrection. He and his aides have maintained that Los Angeles is under siege by a vast horde of criminal migrants. In front of troops at Fort Bragg, Trump declared that California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass are “incompetent” and that “they paid troublemakers, agitators, and insurrectionists” to “aid the occupation of the city by criminal invaders.” He has also said the protests have caused “a lot of death.” And that LA would have been “obliterated,” had he not sent in National Guard troops. His top aides have chimed in. Attorney General Pam Bondi exclaimed, “California is burning.” Stephen Miller, Trump’s minister of malice, tweeted, “Los Angeles is occupied territory.”

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/06/donald-trump-los-angeles-ice-protests-kristi-noem-alex-padilla/

The first couple of paragraphs are about Trump using disinformation since his 2016 campaign. I skipped ahead to more recent information.

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Will Trump's Disinformation Presidency Lead to Civil War? (Original Post) AZProgressive Jun 18 OP
The last sentence is wrong... Dan Jun 18 #1
I edited AZProgressive Jun 18 #4
Considering recent reports of police involved in disarming some people who came armed to No Kings, Attilatheblond Jun 18 #2
Eventually, yes. sinkingfeeling Jun 18 #3
We are in a The Wizard Jun 18 #5
Unlikely OC375 Jun 18 #6
I see no other viable alternative the_liberal_grandpa Jun 18 #7

Dan

(4,823 posts)
1. The last sentence is wrong...
Wed Jun 18, 2025, 10:25 AM
Jun 18

Trump has been lying and making up stuff since he learned to talk.

AZProgressive

(29,698 posts)
4. I edited
Wed Jun 18, 2025, 10:31 AM
Jun 18

The first couple of paragraphs are about Trump using disinformation since his 2016 campaign. I skipped ahead to more recent information.

Attilatheblond

(6,643 posts)
2. Considering recent reports of police involved in disarming some people who came armed to No Kings,
Wed Jun 18, 2025, 10:28 AM
Jun 18

Considering the woman just stopped from pulling her Sig Sauer P320 at one protest location and a couple chaps with a rather lethal assortment of party favors in their truck busted at another, I would say it has already started.

OC375

(132 posts)
6. Unlikely
Wed Jun 18, 2025, 10:51 AM
Jun 18

My money is on "The Troubles", Northern Ireland style, rather than the Blue and the Grey. Everything is connected andd there are no front lines, just hues of red, purple and blue... almost everywhere. Policitcally verbose and diverse ares would be hardest hit with terrorism. Not a good way to be.

7. I see no other viable alternative
Wed Jun 18, 2025, 10:54 AM
Jun 18

First of all, I do not want civil war. I am 70 years old and want to live out my years in peace as I do for daughter and my grandchildren.

But just looking at the election there were roughly 70 million voters on each side. I assume those that didn't vote are likely split the same way.

I am not optimistic that that many people can all get along.

The first civil war started similarly when half the country was pro slavery and the other was not.

No amount of negotiation stopped warfrom breaking out as, like today, the country was a pot of water getting ready to boil over.

When Democrats take over again which will not happen soon enough, and start making changes you will probably see lots of threats of seccession or violence from red states.

If Democrats don't take over and the repubs continue down the path they are on you may see threats of seccession from blue states, like my state- California.

Our protests are large and will get larger now that those who were afraid to protests see that they are not alone but if they do not result in change, frustration and anger will take over and violence is likely to ensue.

There will be conflict somewhere in this country.

I think that is invevitable

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