Is Donald Trump’s MAGA movement true American populism, or a fake?
Is Donald Trump’s “MAGA” movement real populism? Is it a genuinely democratic movement that truly works to benefit common people, or a political cause that uses the average American’s concerns to gain power?
It might seem truly populist. Trump sought to appeal to non-college educated, lower middle-class Americans whose incomes had flatlined since the early 1980s. He and his advisers shrewdly perceived the deep political alienation of many working-class whites.
The candidate told blue-collar voters that globalists in both parties had not defended their interests as they pursued their neo-liberal economic policies. Accordingly, Trump made sweeping promises to bring back domestic manufacturing, end job outsourcing, and erect tariff barriers to protect American farmers from foreign competition.
Knowing the history of American populism can help us distinguish authentic populists from the fakes. The original populists of the 1890s conducted America’s first great experiment in mass insurgent politics. Beginning as a radically egalitarian movement composed mostly of farmers, the populism of the 1890s became a third political party at a convention in Cincinnati in 1891.
The People’s Party (their official name) protested that America’s “producing classes” had not shared in their era’s robust economic growth. Spokesman Ignatius Donnelly lamented that “the fruits of the toil of millions are boldly stolen to build up colossal fortunes, unprecedented in the history of the world, while their possessors despise the republic and endanger liberty.”
Kansas firebrand Mary Elizabeth Lease declared that the nation was ruled by “a government of Wall Street, by Wall Street, and for Wall Street.” “The great common people of this country are slaves,” she cried, “and monopoly is the master.”
A year later, the party gathered in Omaha, Nebraska, to nominate a presidential ticket and draft a party platform. The Populists, as they were known, envisaged an expanded role for government to level the playing field and to promote and protect the interests of the dispossessed. The platform called for nationalizing the railroads and for the government to own and operate the telegraph and telephone systems “in the interest of the people.” Populists demanded a graduated income tax and tough legal restrictions to prevent land speculation.
In short, in the “Omaha Platform,” they pushed sweeping measures designed to alleviate economic inequality and the marginalization of farmers and urban factory workers. (As it happened, they never had much luck winning urban labor to their side.)
What does their example tell us about how populist Trump and the MAGA movement are? The record of Congressional Republicans during the Trump administration stands in dramatic contrast with the platform of the original Populists.
The Trump campaign populism of 2016 was mostly rhetorical. Trump did help American farmers with agricultural tariffs aimed at China, but his administration’s policies neither spurred domestic manufacturing nor elevated sagging blue collar incomes. The Economic Policy Institute reported that nearly 1,800 factories disappeared between 2016 and 2018.
The results of Trump’s vaunted tax cuts belie his populist pretensions even more. As Forbes reported: in 2018, “For the first time in American history, the 400 wealthiest people paid a lower tax rate than any other group.”
You know there’s a serious fairness problem when one of the chief plutocrats, Bill Gates, concedes: “I need to pay higher taxes.” Writing in The Atlantic, Chris Murphy concludes that Trump’s entire term was an “unending parade of gifts to the very status quo forces he condemned in his rise to power.”
One of the very first bills Republican leaders advanced is legislation to dramatically decrease funding for the IRS. On the surface, this looks like a popular measure ( who likes the tax man?). But as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute put it: “Cutting IRS funding is a gift to America’s wealthiest tax evaders.” This definitely isn’t what the original Populists had in mind when they advocated a progressive income tax.
Democrats also have their own version of fake populism. Barack Obama’s rhetoric, for instance, didn’t always sync with his actions. At a tense meeting with top bank CEOs in March 2009 during the sub-prime crisis, President Obama chose not to go after Wall Street, famously telling them that he was their true protector: “I’m the only one between you and the pitchforks.” The original pitchfork-brandishing Populists would not have been pleased.
Furthermore, the ill-concealed disrespect that cosmopolitan Democratic leaders show for the local loyalties and traditional religious faith of working-class Americans stands in stark contrast with original Populist leaders such as “Sockless” Jerry Simpson or the “Great Commoner” himself, William Jennings Bryan.
One can certainly debate the wisdom of the policies outlined in the Omaha Platform. But as a sign of respect for the genuine Populists of the 1890s, let’s reserve the populist label for the real thing. Today’s fake populism is more a species of demagoguery than a genuinely democratic movement that truly works to benefit common people.