Trump's supporters just aren't that smart.
No surprise, Trump isn't that smart either.
A Trump supporter would immediately argue with me. They'd be angry and insulted with the label I hung on them, and incredulous that I would think that someone who was a billionaire and president of the United States wasn't, by definition, smart. I guess if defrauding the government, cheating your customers, stiffing your contractors and still bankrupting your businesses several times is smart, then I suppose I'm wrong. Trump's fortune was originally based on inheriting his father's real estate business. Fred Trump's unethical shenanigans have been well-documented, and his ill-gotten gains should have gotten him thrown in prison for fraud. Donald took over the family business by screwing over his siblings and several times almost lost it all. It's been said that if he simply put his inheritance into a money market fund he'd have a fortune many times larger than what he supposedly has now. It's no secret that prior to his deification as a business god on The Apprentice Trump ran business after business into the ground, bankrupting several casinos and losing millions on bad real estate deals. If he can be considered smart in any category, it's his choice of smart lawyers and accountants. Even when businesses he ran went belly-up, he managed to secure a paycheck for himself. Once The Apprentice created his reputation as a consummate deal-maker, banks fell over each other to loan him money, even when he became a serial defaulter. He became too big to fail. He was obviously not a good businessman, but his supporters were too stupid to see that.
Once in office Trump's stupidity in the realm of government became obvious. He may have been politically aware enough to get elected by telling people what they wanted to hear, but he had no idea how things worked, whether in government, economics or international relations. One example of his willful ignorance is tariffs. He persisted in his belief that foreign governments pay tariffs and that a trade deficit meant that we were losing money. In his second term he imposed tariffs with little regard to any discernable strategic objective, and held on to his lack of understanding like a security blanket. His constant blustering about the 2% NATO spending goal was another example. Should NATO nations take on more responsibility for their own defense? Of course. But the 2% figure was not "dues" or payments where the United States was picking up the slack, but was a percentage of GNP that each NATO member was supposed to be spending on their military. Of course our percentage was higher since we had a military presence throughout the world, where most NATO members' militaries were concentrated close to home. Surely someone was attempting to correct him -- maybe not, he doesn't like to admit he's wrong. That's just two easily checked examples of him insisting on a view that isn't factual. It's not even a matter of interpretation. He's just wrong.
Which brings us to the stupidity of Trump supporters.
Most of what Trump says can be easily checked. Referring to my examples in the previous paragraph, they will celebrate as a "win" Trump's actions on tariffs when high school level economics will debunk everything he says. His ramblings about NATO spending can be checked with a 20 second Google search. They high-five each other over Trump victories that didn't happen. How many MAGA folks think the current budget bill eliminates taxes on Social Security and tips? (Spoiler alert: it doesn't -- it does contain some new deductions that are supposed to balance out those taxes). How many Trumpists believe that Trump brought peace to Israel and Iran after dropping bombs on Iran?
Trump lies. Of course his apologists will either deny that he's lying, or will claim that all politicians lie, so it's no big deal that Trump does. Usually they just ignore the lie and engage in some "whataboutism" and point out some lie that a Democrat supposedly told. Sometimes the lie is so obviously transparent, so obviously a lie, so easily checkable, that anyone who believes it has to truly be stupid. I sometimes see posts or tweets doing a victory lap about some supposed Trump accomplishments and think "None of that happened". Do Trump voters not have internet access? Or are they just stupid? To be clear, I'm not talking about whether a particular policy is good or bad, or that I disagree with projected results, but whether or not something actually happened!
I'm sure that Trump supporters believe that they are very smart and discerning. The evidence would suggest otherwise.
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