Trump’s decisive victory in the 2024 US Presidential elections is disturbing yet not surprising. He has steadily entered the American psyche and now sits at the centre of its political system for a second time. In a symbolic turn of events on election night it was the state of Wisconsin that tipped Trump over the threshold of victory in the electoral college, in a repeat of his unexpected defeat of Clinton back in 2016.
The reasons for his victory include persistent and growing socio-economic inequalities that have fuelled a toxic politics of retribution. The failure of progressive politicians to counter the pervasive myth that migration has caused declining living standards rather than the structural causes of inequality within capitalism has enabled rising levels of racism and intolerance almost everywhere. Trump’s victory is indicative of new forms of reactionary intersectionality between toxic masculinity and religious bigotry that mirror political trends in Brazil, the Philippines, and elsewhere.
A dark media ecology has been swirling with lies and misinformation for years, seeping into almost every dimension of public culture. Trump’s victory is in no small measure due to the high-profile support of Elon Musk in a further advance for techno-feudalism, the fossil fuel industry, and oligopolistic elites. The spectacle of Musk handing out cash prizes to Trump supporters on stage is reminiscent of the dystopian world of Darren Aronofsky’s film Requiem for a dream (2000) where the American dream has turned into a form of nihilistic desperation. Trump’s victory will undoubtedly prove to be a “swindle of fulfilment” in Ernst Bloch’s words.
