He died like a dog,” is not a phrase one would usually get to hear in the official speech of the US president. But, then, that’s a Donald Trump delivery, straight from the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House. “He died after running into a dead-end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,” was how the 45th president described the death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the fugitive ISIS leader who blew himself up during a US military operation in Syria in 2019.No prizes for guessing whether the speech was scripted or the Don himself rewrote the original drab text into a sparkling copy, so to speak.The transcript of Trump’s spoken words, still available in the White House archives as a testimony to his chutzpah, illustrates the extent to which the businessman-turned-politician is ready to make a spectacle of himself, if it helps him connect with his supporters at a deeply personal level.That attitude seems to have helped him ‘bigly’ in the hotly contested 2024 presidential election which dumbfounded every other poll forecaster. Not known to back down from a good fight, Trump had refused to accept defeat in 2019 to Joe Biden, alarming many. There were legitimate concerns that he might not concede defeat this time as well, if the results were the opposite. And that’s what the opinion polls by most media outlets and traditional pollsters showed: that the poll was very tight; that his opponent Kamala Harris was leading by a narrow margin; and that he might lose again. But Trump would have none of it and rubbished the polls with his characteristic disdain for legacy media, saying he’s clearly winning by a comfortable margin. And that’s exactly what it turned out to be, to the chagrin of his baiters, as he became the first former president in over 130 years to be re-elected after losing a term in between. Top boot, he won both the popular and Electoral College votes, staging one of the most stunning political comebacks in US history. The 4-million margin with which he won the popular vote is a feat no Republican can boast of since George HW Bush’s 7-million vote lead in 1988.Not just that, his Republican Party is set to possibly win control of both chambers of Congress, which will give them sweeping powers to ram through contentious agendas on tax and government spending cuts, tweaks in immigration policy, and de-regulating certain sectors to spur growth. A situation that can make even an always-serious Trump break into that rare smile of his.That he won the 2024 race with the baggage of his tumultuous past presidency characterised by the dramatic exits and surprise firings of his aides, is a big boost to his ego that was hurt by past political and legal setbacks. He fought hard and turned the legal hurdles raised by his political opponents to stop him from coming back, into opportunities to deepen his connection with his existing fans and expand his support base. The 2024 campaign was anything but ordinary. Trump used every tool in the book, and outside of it, to counter his opponents who flagged his colourful history in a bid to discredit him. There were two reported attempts to assassinate him; he narrowly escaped the first one, with the bullet grazing his ear and bloodying his face.Trump being Trump, he never lost an opportunity to communicate with the people, dog whistling that their potential president was being targeted. He turned their inchoate anger into righteous indignation, which would reflect in the ballots. He was ably helped by his new ally the formidable billionaire Elon Musk, who turned his own social media platform X into a digital media vehicle to promote Trumpisms. That kind of media ubiquity, where people feel like they are connected to a big personality, helped Trump keep his supporters engaged and excited.In his previous stint as president and the four years afterwards, Trump courted controversy after controversy winning many dubious distinctions, including that of a convicted felon. While in office, he was impeached twice. After he left the White House, he went on to become the first former US president to be convicted of a crime when a New York state jury found him guilty of falsifying business records to hide a hush-money payment he made in 2016, to kill a sex scandal.Trump still faces criminal charges relating to interfering with the 2016 presidential election, though the proceedings are in the process of being frozen in view of the change in circumstances. His supporters expect Trump to shake up the Department of Justice.Trump has on record said that he would fire special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two federal indictments against him, “within two seconds” of being sworn in as President. Probably sensing unnecessary trouble, the prosecutor himself has moved a request to the judge overseeing Trump’s federal election interference case to pause the proceedings in view of the DoJ’s policy that sitting presidents can’t be prosecuted. The pause is seen as the first step towards ending the prosecution.Will Trump 2.0 be better or at least any different than last time? His supporters have been promised “four greatest years in Ame rican history”. As Trump put it, “You watch, it’s going to be so good, it’s going to be so much fun. It’ll be nasty a little bit at times, and may be at the beginning, in particular, but it’s going to be something.”Trump fans can’t wait for his inauguration in January to experience the golden days, while the world watches in earnest interest.Trump can’t change. As he picks his A team, there is a sense of relief that at least the people around are likely to be suave.
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