It's starting to look like Donald Trump is deliberately wrecking the economy. As Robert Kuttner at the American Prospect wrote this week, "no other president has gone out of his way to create a collapse," but there's no other way to interpret Trump's actions. Pointless tariffs will only jack up inflation. Illegally shutting down much of the federal government and laying off thousands at random will suck money out of the economy, forcing a recession. Both consumer confidence and the stock market are diving and a likely surge in unemployment — driven in no small part by Elon Musk recklessly firing federal workers without regard for law or necessity — will make it worse. And if all these federal cuts lead, as expected, to people not getting Social Security checks or health coverage, the disaster will likely spiral.
Kuttner can't decide if Trump wants the economy to crash or if his actions are "based on sheer ignorance and impulsivity." Trump, however, indicated malicious intent during his seemingly endless speech in front of Congress on Tuesday night. Trump mocked the fears over imminent inflation by sneering that it's merely "a little disturbance." It's a familiar rhetorical move of his to paint his victims as whiners. In this case, however, his victims include most Americans, who aren't independently wealthy and can't simply afford rising costs and massive job losses.
Trump mocked the fears over imminent inflation by sneering that it's merely "a little disturbance." It's a familiar rhetorical move of his to paint his victims as whiners.
It's an understatement to call it "unprecedented" to have a president who hates most Americans, including his own voters, and wants them to suffer. But, as Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times persuasively argued Wednesday, Trump's psychology makes it explicable. Trump's "every executive function exists to satisfy his ego," Bouie wrote. He continues to whine on a near-daily basis about losing the 2020 election. "[I]t stands to reason that Trump would want revenge against the public," Bouie concluded, adding that Trump is now undergoing "a retribution campaign against the American people." Thomas Edsall of the New York Times spoke with psychologists who confirmed Bouie's layman understanding of Trump's disordered mental state. They affirmed that Trump suffers from "a congenital sense of entitlement," whose personality is like that of "street toughs, bullies, abusive husbands and hate-crime perpetrators." Even in the 2024 election, he didn't get over 50% of the vote. It makes sense that, after nearly a decade of most Americans rejecting him, a malignant narcissist like Trump would detest Americans categorically, and wish nothing more than to punish them all.
As for his supporters, there's good reason Trump enjoys hurting them, as well. One of his favorite moves is to humiliate people who are dumb enough to fawn over him. Even during Tuesday's speech, he reminded us he loves to kick someone in the face after they bent to kiss his feet. After congratulating Marco Rubio for getting the secretary of state job — for which Rubio had to repeatedly prostrate himself — Trump threatened him. "Good luck, Marco. Now we know who to blame if anything goes wrong," Trump said, relishing one more bit of public shaming of a man who has done so much to flatter him.
Want more Amanda Marcotte on politics? Subscribe to her newsletter Standing Room Only.
Like most abusers, Trump's go-to move when challenged is to blame his victims. Unlike most abusers, however, Trump has a small army of spinmeisters and apologists who will echo his victim-blaming rhetoric. As the economic damage starts to balloon out, the number of people who will be told that they brought this on themselves will grow — likely until most Americans are being blamed for what Trump inflicted on them.
"Perhaps they’re not fit to have a job at this moment," argued Trump's lawyer, Alina Habba, when asked by a reporter Tuesday about veterans who are being fired in Musk's sweeping layoffs of federal workers. An estimated one-third of federal workers are veterans.
Alina Habba on veterans who have been fired from government jobs: "Perhaps they're not fit to have a job at this moment."
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) March 4, 2025 at 1:34 PM
Habba did offer some throat-clearing about "we care about veterans," but was focused mainly on painting veterans as lazy, claiming they're "not willing to come to work." This is straight-up gaslighting. All reporting shows the federal layoffs are indiscriminate, without performance review or auditing. Musk and his "Department of Government Efficiency" (DOGE) keep mass-firing people, only to freak out and beg them to come back when it's revealed their jobs were not, in fact, inessential. This happened to people who maintain nuclear weapons. On Tuesday, 180 fired CDC workers were ordered to return to work. In other cases, Musk admits the jobs were essential — such as with people who prevent Ebola transmission — but "forgets" to restore the funding. Many fired federal workers have produced years of stellar performance reviews. Many were fired right after a promotion.
Not that Trump's minions care if their victim-blaming makes sense. Trump's Agriculture Secretary, Brooke Rollins, raised eyebrows this week when she suggested that the solution to soaring egg prices is for Americans to buy backyard chickens. "We've got chickens in our backyard," she told Fox News. "People are sort of looking around and thinking, 'Wow, maybe I could get a chicken in my backyard. And it's awesome!"
Trump’s Sec of Agriculture Brooke Rollins says the solution to high egg prices for Americans is to get some chickens and raise them in your backyard.
— Ron Filipkowski (@ronfilipkowski.bsky.social) March 3, 2025 at 6:41 PM
This wasn't just a one-off statement, either. In the Wall Street Journal, Rollins wrote an op-ed arguing, "We also want to make it easier for families to raise backyard chickens." In reality, it's not government regulations preventing most Americans from setting up a chicken farm in their backyard. Most people don't want to do that or don't have the room. But it would be foolish to regard Rollins' suggestion as a good-faith idea. Instead, this should be seen as more victim-blaming. The implication is that if $8 for a dozen eggs is too expensive for you, it's your fault for not having the foresight to set up your own chicken coop — one that's magically immune, no less, from bird flu.
The foundation for the victim-blaming administration was laid most thoroughly during Robert Kennedy's confirmation hearing to be secretary of Health and Human Services. Throughout, Kennedy repeatedly blamed not the health insurance companies or failing infrastructure for soaring health care costs, but patients themselves. He insisted both that "chronic illness" was the sole cause of excessive health care spending and that most chronic illnesses were based on people's personal failures. He especially focused on the idea that his esoteric diet ideas — which include consuming a lot of fried foods, which doctors definitely don't recommend — will fix it all, with the implication that no other medical interventions are needed.
We need your help to stay independent
Kennedy's victim-blaming attitude looks increasingly like it will be the standard response of the Trump administration to all their failures, especially the economic disaster that Trump is inducing. Most alarming so far is how Trump teed up an excuse to take away Social Security checks from elderly people on Tuesday night. He went on an extended rant falsely accusing millions of recipients of defrauding the government, claiming that the system shows millions of people over 110 years old are drawing checks. This lie, which Musk also likes to repeat, has been thoroughly and repeatedly debunked. But it also doesn't make sense. If you were going to defraud the Social Security Administration, why would you pretend to be 120 years old? Wouldn't a fraudster come up with a fake identity that's more likely to pass notice, such as a 75-year-old?
As usual, however, making sense is not the point. The Social Security lie was concocted for a sole and obvious reason: as an excuse when people's Social Security checks stop showing up. The threat of this is not a distant one, either. Musk has heavily targeted Social Security offices for closures, and Democrats are warning that, when you "don’t have people to write the checks," the checks won't come. Former Social Security chief Martin O'Malley told CNBC he worries that, within the next few months, the U.S. is "going to see the system collapse and an interruption of benefits." The myth of millions of "fake" people on the rolls suggests Musk and Trump anticipate this collapse, too. They're already teeing up their excuse when payments disappear, which is that the recipients were "frauds" and needed to be cut.
Victim-blaming comes naturally to Trump, especially in response to the over two dozen women who have accused him of sexual abuse. In that case, it often works for him, because there's so much sexism in American society that people are ready to believe a woman who allows herself to be alone with a man deserves whatever violence he inflicts on her. But there may be limits to American tolerance for victim-blaming, especially when the victim pool encompasses the vast majority of Americans. Economic collapse is especially hard to blame on the little guys, instead of the person in charge, especially one like Trump, who rejected all sound advice like "tariffs cause inflation" and "mass unemployment is bad."
Personally, I think Trump is tanking the economy on purpose, because he's a narcissist who has decided to punish Americans for failing to show him the deference he feels he deserves. But even if one chalks his behavior up to stupidity instead of malice, the outcome is the same. The economy is likely to crash and, when it does, Trump will blame anyone but himself. How many people believe him is the only question left outstanding.
Shares