Why attacking Trump’s character has proven so ineffective

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Donald Trump has had incredibly good fortune in his life, and this election cycle has been no different. So enfeebled was his original opponent, Joe Biden, that he had to be replaced a few months out from voting day. Trump came centimetres from being killed by a bullet — quite possibly because he turned his head “at the exact right time and in just the right amount” (his own words) — in an assassination attempt that, while only slightly grazing his ear, greatly bolstered his image.

And then, just when it seemed the tables might be turning after a comedian at his Madison Square Garden rally made several racist and offensive comments, including a joke about Puerto Rico being an “island of garbage”, Lady Luck came to bless the former president once again.

In a video call, Joe Biden managed to grab back the negative attention. “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters,” the president probably said. (The White House later provided a transcript that placed an apostrophe in “supporter’s”, which only served to make matters worse after it was reported that the press office had altered the stenography office’s transcript.)

Both rightwing commentators and Trump himself were quick to draw comparisons between Biden’s words and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 reference to Trump supporters being in a “basket of deplorables”, which Clinton subsequently said was a factor in her election defeat. Trump even rode around in a branded garbage truck on Wednesday in Wisconsin wearing a high-vis vest as a stunt. “That’s like ‘deplorable’ for Hillary,” he told reporters. “And I think this is worse, actually. For Joe Biden to make that statement, it’s really a disgrace.”

That a convicted criminal who has so far been found guilty of 34 counts of felony and still has three criminal cases hanging over him, who has been found liable for sexual abuse and who still refuses to accept the results of a democratic election is able to call the other side “a disgrace” with a straight face demonstrates the topsy-turvy nature of US politics.

The Democratic campaign is trying to present this election as one that comes down to a choice about moral principles. As Biden said just before his “garbage” gaffe, “presidential historians tell us the most important thing about a president is character — does he or she have character?” It should be easy to show why their nominee Kamala Harris wins breezily on that score.

And yet Democrats have been warned by Future Forward, the leading super political action committee (PAC) backing Harris, that focusing too narrowly on Trump’s character and linking him to dangerous political ideologies in the closing stages of the campaign was not proving particularly effective.

They are right. There are several difficulties with attacking Trump’s character. For a start, while it might be fair and indeed accurate to point out the gulf that separates him from Harris when it comes to the virtues a leader should possess — basic decency, honour, compassion, honesty, humility — moral grandstanding is an ineffective way to convince people to come over to your side. It gives an air of superiority and priggishness. 

And while many of the Democrats’ attack lines against Trump have been fair, others have been less so. Harris’s quips about him being “exhausted”, which Future Forward also warned against, are unconvincing and only serve to chip away at the integrity of her own side.

The other reason attacking Trump in this way is so ineffective is that he possesses some qualities that make him look like he does have moral character, notably courage. Elon Musk wasn’t the only multi-billionaire who gushed about Trump’s bravery after he got up and shouted “Fight! Fight! Fight!”, after the attempt on his life on July 13. “Our former President showed tremendous grace and courage under literal fire tonight,” Jeff Bezos posted on X.

The kind of courage displayed by Trump is not the sort that Aristotle spoke of — the kind that acts as a mediator between the vice of cowardice and the vice of recklessness for the sake of the greater good. “There’s a physical, animalistic courage in Trump, but there’s an absence of virtuous courage,” Edward Brooks, executive director of the Oxford Character Project, tells me.

And yet somehow Trump manages to come across as a man of principle. A recent Pew survey found 69 per cent of voters feel he “stands up for what he believes in”, nine points more than for Harris.

We will soon find out whether Trump’s luck has finally run out. But what is already clear is that while he might have the veneer of moral character, he has precious little of the virtue. 

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