How Donald Trump broke the American mind

How Donald Trump broke the American mind
Trumpism's real threat isn't political chaos. It's cognitive collapse

By Sophia A. McClennen
Contributing Writer
Published November 3, 2025 6:30AM (EST)


(Salon) President Donald Trump’s decision to demolish the East Wing of the White House to make way for a ballroom is classic Trumpian theater — grandiose destruction packaged as vision. But the stories of the institutions, buildings and legacies that Trump and his team have destroyed aren’t the most disturbing threats our nation faces. What’s truly at risk of collapsing is the country’s cognitive infrastructure.

The real wreckage of Trumpism isn’t political chaos or partisan decay — it’s the slow demolition of the American mind.

The success of any autocrat lies in their ability to mesmerize their supporters and mentally paralyze the resistance. Opposition depends not only on organized protests, but on the collective capacity to think through the crisis. Despots, knowing this, endeavor to do everything in their power to shut down our ability to think outside of their established narratives.

This means that, while turnout for the “No Kings” protests is cause for optimism, effective resistance will require more than clever signs and animated crowds. It will demand careful attention to the cognitive toll of living under an absurd autocracy that claims to defend democracy while simultaneously dismantling it. How can the collective consciousness of pro-democracy Americans withstand the mental assault of Trumpism?

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Trump’s politics depend on what psychologists call cognitive overload. He lies so relentlessly that even his detractors become mentally fatigued as the brain’s basic truth-tracking mechanisms begin to short-circuit. Research by psychologists Gordon Pennycook and David G. Rand shows that repeated exposure to falsehoods erodes the brain’s resistance: The more often we hear a claim — true or false — the more familiar, and thus believable, it feels. ....................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/11/03/how-donald-trump-broke-the-american-mind/