Is the Trump Myth Finally Being Shattered?

Published in Clarín
(Mexico) on 19 July 2025
by John Carlin (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Stephen Routledge. Edited by Michelle Bisson.
For the first time since entering the presidential ring, Trump is on the ropes because of the Epstein case.

If we lived in normal times — times of peace rather than war, stability rather than chaos, reality rather than lies — it would be reasonable to think that an alleged sex scandal would be the first thing to precipitate a revolt by MAGA loyalists against their idol 10 years on.

But these are not normal times, and issues with far greater importance to humanity have had no impact whatsoever on the abject loyalty of King Donald's subjects.

It doesn't matter that the White House has become a throne of kleptocracy, that Donald Trump and his family have used the power of the presidency to make more than $2 billion in six months from their cryptocurrency and real estate businesses. It doesn't matter that the courts have convicted Trump of fraud and found him liable for sexual abuse, or that he says things on television about his attitude toward women such as, “When you're a star, you can do anything [...] grab them by the pussy […] anything.”

It doesn't matter that he is cutting foreign aid programs or imposing tariffs on the world's poorest countries, ruining African economies and causing the death of hundreds of thousands of people from AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis. It doesn't matter that he does something very similar in his own country, cutting public health spending for the most disadvantaged and denying access to medical care to an estimated 10 million of his people by 2034.

It doesn't matter that the money saved by these cuts, approved by a subservient Congress, is being invested in masked paramilitaries who imprison thousands of people for looking Mexican and, in several cases, deport them without lawful due process. Or that in exchange for making the poor poorer and sicker, the 1% of Americans who already own 50% of the national wealth will pay less taxes.

It doesn't matter — it matters less because they happen in faraway lands — that Trump talks about invading Canada or Greenland, or that he has enjoyed a decade-long relationship, one of admiration and love, with Russian serial killer Vladimir Putin, that his first reaction to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was that Putin was a “very smart guy,” that Trump accused the Ukrainian president of starting the war, and that, until very recently, he had stopped sending defensive weapons to Ukraine to mitigate the impact from daily bombardment of Ukrainian civilians.

His other great love affair, the one he has with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, will last until the happy day until death do them part. Further proof, as if any were needed, came a few days ago at the White House, where the Israeli serial killer announced that he had nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. It does not matter that Dresden in 1945 was a neat and tidy city compared to Gaza today, where 5% of the buildings and 0% of the hospitals are still standing, where an estimated 50,000 people, many of them children, have been killed since Israel began its savage military response to the massacre perpetrated by Hamas in October 2023.

It does not matter that Trump is the chief accomplice in what many consider genocide; though I do not, because I prefer not to trivialize the horror that Netanyahu is guilty of with a word that, due to the banal promiscuity with which it is used, has lost the moral force it once conveyed.

That Trump is a thief, an ignoramus, a clown, a sexual harasser, a textbook narcissist, a psychopath immune to the misfortune of others — none of this has caught his supporters' attention. They have not even wanted to see it.
This is no trivial matter. Epstein was the New York billionaire who allegedly committed suicide in prison, where he stood accused of pedophilia and trafficking women. The “case,” which is all the rage in the MAGA world, is that the U.S. Justice Department reportedly has a list of celebrities whom Epstein invited to parties where he introduced them to women for sex, several of whom were minors. When Trump announced a couple of weeks ago that nothing was going on here, that no such list existed, MAGA fanatics, including some previously staunch supporters of the president, were outraged.

It was the unimaginable. Trump was covering up the truth! Trump might be on the list! Could Trump belong (heaven forbid!) to the “corrupt elite” we so abhor?

I repeat, the issue is not trivial. What is trivial is the reason it is causing such a furor. It has nothing to do with criminal machismo or women's rights. (If it did, how did they elect a known sexual abuser as president?) No. It's about gossip, morbid curiosity, and the most desired outcome to the drama that entertains viewers of the endless reality show starring Trump the most. Moral component: zero. Just as there is zero moral component in any reaction to the Trump family's theft, to the pain of immigrants, the poor, Gaza, and Ukraine.

But what is interesting, what is new, is that for the first time since he entered the presidential ring, Trump is on the ropes. Would it be too much to believe that his loyal followers will finally open their eyes and see that it has all been a sham, that the liar has taken them for fools, that the emperor has no clothes? Probably. But we must not lose hope. We must continue to believe, even in the parallel MAGA universe, that Abraham Lincoln was right when he said, "You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time."*

*Editor’s note: This quote, generally but not always attributed to Abraham Lincoln, is accurately translated but could not be independently verified.


Si viviésemos en tiempos normales --de paz y no de guerra, de estabilidad y no de caos, de realidad y no de mentira- se podría entender como razonable que un presunto escándalo sexual fuera lo primero que haya precipitado, diez años después, una revuelta de los fieles MAGA contra su ídolo.

Pero, como no son tiempos normales, cosas de muchísima mayor transcendencia para la humanidad no han incidido en absoluto en la abyecta lealtad de los súbditos hacia el rey Donald.

No importa que la Casa Blanca se haya convertido en el trono de una cleptocracia, que Trump y su familia hayan utilizado el poder de la presidencia para obtener en seis meses más de dos mil millones de dólares con sus negocios de criptomonedas o inmobiliaria. No importa que los tribunales hayan condenado a Trump por fraude o abuso sexual, o que diga cosas en televisión sobre su actitud hacia las mujeres como que, “Cuando sos una estrella podés hacer lo que querés…agarrarlas por la concha, cualquier cosa”.

No importa que elimine programas de ayuda al extranjero o que imponga aranceles a los países más pobres del mundo, causando la ruina de economías africanas o las muertes de cientos de miles de personas de SIDA, o malaria, o tuberculosos. No importa que haga algo muy similar en su propio país, cortando el presupuesto de salud pública para los más desfavorecidos, negando el acceso a la atención médica a diez millones de sus compatriotas para el año 2034, se calcula.

No importa que el dinero ahorrado con estos recortes, aprobados por el sumiso Congreso, se invierta en paramilitares enmascarados que encarcelan a miles de personas por su aspecto mexicano y, en varios casos, los deporten sin recurso alguno a la ley. O que a cambio de que los pobres sean más pobres, y más enfermos, el uno por ciento de los estadounidenses que ya son dueños del 50 por ciento de la riqueza nacional pagarán menos impuestos.

No importa -importa menos porque se trata de cosas que ocurren en tierras lejanas-que Trump hable de invadir Canadá o Groenlandia o que haya disfrutado durante una década de una relación de admiración y amor con el asesino en serie ruso Vladímir Putin, que su primera reacción a la invasión rusa de Ucrania en 2022 haya sido que Putin era un “tipo muy inteligente”, que hubiese acusado al presidente de Ucrania de haber iniciado la guerra, y que hasta hace muy poco hubiese cesado el envío de armamentos defensivos a Ucrania para mitigar el impacto del bombardeo diario a los civiles ucranianos.

Su otra gran relación de amor, la que tiene con el primer ministro israelí Benjamin Netanyahu, durará hasta el feliz día en el que la muerte les separe. Más prueba de ello, si cabe: un encuentro hace unos días en la Casa Blanca en la que el asesino en serie israelí anunció que había nominado a Trump para el Premio Nobel de la Paz. No importa que Dresden en 1945 fue una urbe ordenada y pulcra comparada hoy con Gaza, donde el cinco por ciento de los edificios y el cero por ciento de los hospitales sigue en pie, donde se estima que han muerto más de 50.000 personas, muchos de ellos niños, desde que Israel inició su salvaje respuesta militar a la masacre que perpetuó Hamás en octubre de 2023.

No importa que Trump sea el cómplice en jefe de lo que muchos consideran un genocidio, pero yo no, porque prefiero no frivolizar el horror del que es culpable Netanyahu con una palabra que, por la banal promiscuidad con que se utiliza, ha dejado de poseer la fuerza moral que una vez transmitió.

Que Trump sea un ladrón, un ignorante, un payaso, un acosador sexual, un narcisista de manual, un psicópata inmune a la desdicha ajena: nada de esto les ha llamado la atención a los suyos. No lo han querido ni ver.

Lo que sí les importa, lo que tiene a muchos de ellos tan histéricos que han empezado a cuestionar su una vez ciega fe en el monarca naranja, es el caso Epstein. No es trivial el asunto. Jeffrey Epstein fue el multimillonario neoyorquino que se suicidó, aparentemente, en la cárcel, acusado de pederastia y tráfico de mujeres. El “caso”, sonadísimo en el mundo MAGA, es que supuestamente el Departamento de Justicia de Estados Unidos posee una lista de famosos que Epstein invitaba a fiestas donde les presentaba a mujeres para sexo, varias de ellas menores de edad. Cuando Trump anunció hace un par de semanas que aquí no pasaba nada, que dicha lista no existía, los maniáticos MAGA, incluyendo algunos congresistas previamente incondicionales del presidente, se escandalizaron.

Lo inimaginable. ¡Trump estaba encubriendo la verdad! ¡Trump quizá esté en la lista! ¿Será que Trump pertenece (¡cielos!) a “la élite corrupta” que tanto aborrecemos?

Repito, el asunto no es trivial. Sí lo es el motivo por que el que causa tanto furor. Nada tiene que ver con el machismo criminal o los derechos de las mujeres. (Si no, ¿cómo fue que eligieron como presidente a un reconocido abusador sexual?) No. Se trata de chusmerío, de morbo, del desenlace más deseado al drama que más entretiene a los espectadores del reality show sin fin que Trump protagoniza. Componente moral, cero. Igual que componente moral cero en la reacción a los robos de la familia Trump, al dolor de los inmigrantes, los pobres, Gaza y Ucrania.

Pero lo interesante, lo nuevo, es que, por primera vez desde que entró en el ring presidencial, Trump está contra las cuerdas. ¿Sería demasiado creer que a los fieles se les abra los ojos por fin y vean que todo ha sido una farsa, que el embustero les ha tomado por idiotas, que el rey está desnudo? Seguramente. Pero no hay que perder la esperanza. Hay que seguir creyendo, incluso en cuanto al paralelo universo MAGA, en que Lincoln tenía razón cuando dijo que “puedes engañar a algunas personas todo el tiempo, y a todas las personas algún tiempo, pero no puedes engañar a todas las personas todo el tiempo”.
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