The Problem for Trump’s Intellectual Heirs
Donald Trump will be remembered as one of the most consequential presidents in American history. On a political level, he attempted to overturn an election—an unusual enterprise for a president—and popularized the idea that democratic outcomes can be rejected outright if you don’t like the results. Oddly enough, however, Trump’s impact may prove more distinctive and perhaps even more lasting on an intellectual level.
Trump had an instinct that something had gone fundamentally wrong in America and felt that his supporters should be angry as a result. And he came to channel that impulse viscerally. That such an anti-intellectual president could provide inspiration for a distinct intellectual orientation is an amusing twist. The struggle to codify Trumpism and transform it into a working philosophy is under way, to mixed results so far. Earlier this week, self-described “national conservatives” descended upon Miami for of “understand that the past and future of conservatism are inextricably tied to the idea of the nation.” For them, the nation is a distinct cultural unit, whose independence and sovereignty must be jealously guarded against globalists, international institutions, and large-scale immigration. These are not neoconservatives or even just conservatives. For the conservatives, the George W. Bushes and Mitt Romneys of the world are the problem. And they themselves are apparently the solution.
