The Most Surprising Miscalculation of Trump's Second Term

[applegrove]

The Most Surprising Miscalculation of Trump’s Second Term

June 20, 2026 at 6:29 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 27 Comments

https://politicalwire.com/2026/06/20/the-most-surprising-miscalculation-of-trumps-second-term/

Alexander Burns: “A decade ago, Trump waged his first-ever political campaign as a nationalist crusader, demanding harder borders and more muscular American sovereignty. When the United Kingdom held its 2016 referendum on leaving the European Union — the 10-year anniversary is in a few days — Trump cheered it on and crowned himself ‘Mr. Brexit.'”

“In his second term, Trump’s grasp of nationalist politics has slipped. He has underestimated the power of patriotism and national pride in countries other than his own.”

“This serial miscalculation has undermined Trump’s trade wars and military adventures, aggravated the cost-of-living crisis, weakened the Republican Party and battered Trump’s bonds with the global right.”

[RockRaven]

1. Nobody paying attention to his omnipresent inability to express an understanding of what other people are thinking

would find this surprising at all, never mind the most surprising thing.

Trump has always failed to put himself in others' shoes. His expressions about what other people want have always been reality-free reflections of his own desires.

He has never expressed any understanding of other peoples' populist nationalism (what he has expressed is compatriotism with other populist rulers, and that is a large and unsubtle difference). The fact that he continues to not do so is totally expected and completely unsurprising.

[orthoclad]

2. The same behind-scenes manipulators

twisted both the 2016 US election and the Brexit vote.

The global oligarchy understands divide-and-conquer.

[applegrove]

3. Russia.

[orthoclad]

4. Partially, but

I don't think we need to look that far afield to find villains. We have plenty of Doctor No's right here at home. Putin's just one of the gang.

Thinking of Cambridge Analytica and Mark Zuckerthing.

[applegrove]

5. Oh I think Russia is the main player behind both Brexit and Trump.

[orthoclad]

6. Zuckerberg gave T the Electoral College in 2016

He illegally provided private user information to Cambridge Analytica, which used that info to micro-target political ads in key venues.

He was caught, tried, and convicted, and paid a paltry 30k fine. He got billions during Trump 1.0. Good ROI.

I believe CA was also active in Brexit, along with T's good buddy Nigel Farage.

Putin had his hand in, but T didn't need him to screw the 2016 election. Facebook was adequate. But the Russian government had been grooming T for decades, and was a big push to get him into politics. "Krasnov". I wonder how many other agents they had prepped to step into the arena.

Russia, or at least the Russian oligarchy, were the obvious beneficiaries of Brexit, but billionaires in general made out from it. It gave them an escape from the increasingly regulatory environment of the EU.

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

7. "underestimated the power of patriotism and national pride in countries other than his own."

All that insulting of other countries, I know it would bite us in the ass.


I remember kristi noels at the Canada border.

Stepping back and forth saying "USA" "51st state". Just nasty stuff for no reason other than they could