Until Monday, the most compelling image of a failed presidency might have been Richard Nixon’s waving goodbye from the South Lawn as he left the White House for the last time as president.
Donald Trump’s removing his mask and saluting Marine One as it left that same lawn on Monday rivals it. Even for an administration defined by chaos and unpredictability, Trump’s behavior has reached a new level of bizarre.
On Tuesday, the president instructed his administration to stop negotiating with Democrats in Congress on an economic relief bill until after the election, putting at risk a pandemic-ravaged economy and causing financial markets (formerly a point of pride for Trump) to tumble.
As with most things Trump, the country has struggled to make sense. Theories abounded. Trump is experiencing mania brought on by the steroids his doctors have administered, went one. He’s making a political calculation that a stimulus package would benefit blue states, held another.
But Trump’s actions make sense for other, more Trumpian, reasons. An investigation into the president’s finances by The New York Times shows that Trump has avoided paying taxes for years. The reporting also shows that his businesses are “beset by losses” and that he has hundreds of millions of dollars in debt coming due.
Trump’s best hope for financial survival may be another reality show. “The Apprentice” brought Trump a total of $427 million, the Times found, and allowed him to inhabit the character of a billionaire character that he played all the way to the presidency. It cannot be lost on Trump that making reality TV is arguably the only business in which he has ever succeeded.
Add to that the polls, which consistently show Trump trailing his opponent, Joseph R. Biden, in most of the states and counties Trump won in 2016 and would need to carry in November to have any hope of reelection. Trump has not added to his support among any voters who did not support him four years ago, the polls show.
Taken together, circumstances give Trump every incentive to make these remaining weeks of his presidency all about him (that’s been his North Star throughout) and to stage-manage pictures, like the mask-less salute, that might work as the intro to a series.
The more conflict that Trump can sow and the more visuals he can compile, the more compelling a character he can be in the television future that awaits. America has never seen a reality TV show staring a former president, let alone one who appeals to the worst instincts of his supporters.
The White House is now the set of a TV pilot. The less likely it becomes that voters will green-light a second term, the more we can expect to see Trump chasing not votes but ratings.