'It’s settling in': Conservative says something’s finally clicked with MAGA on Trump

It takes a lot to break a cult, but President Donald Trump’s unpopular policies and erratic behavior are so problematic that a pair of conservative commentators suspect he may have managed it.

“My friend's mom said he might be the Antichrist,” The Bulwark’s Tim Miller said to West Virginia conservative podcaster Amanda Carpenter in a Thursday show. “I feel like that's on the outer edge of where three-time Trump voters are. But I do think it's real. If you look at MAGA social media — if you looked at his replies on Truth Social — people were very mad about the post.”

Miller’s comment referred to Trump posting a meme on social media depicting himself as Jesus Christ. While discussing this and Trump’s unpopular Iran war and economic policies with Carpenter, Carpenter pointed out that Trump has “always said crazy stuff," but this time the crazy is clicking in place with people.

"... [F]or some reason, now people are starting to say, ‘What's going on with this?’ Like, I don't find MAGA people — or even just Republican people — saying this war in Iran is going to be a disaster. It's more like, ‘What is he doing with this tone of resignation?’”

She added, “It's kind of settling in, like, maybe this is really going off the rails in a bad way.”

Miller assured “this doesn't mean [Trump supporters are] going to become Democrats," however.

"I think a lot of them are wishing and hoping — and some of them are praying — that he's going to pull a rabbit out of a hat and it's all going to work out. But that doesn't mean the concerns aren't real.”

“And then you see the other discourse,” Carpenter replied. “What is he doing? What is he doing with these social media images? I mean, they are intentional. You have the image of him descending like Christ, and then there are these weird demonic figures at the top. Maybe you'd think, 'Oh, that's just conspiracy stuff.' But what is that? What are they doing? What inputs did the staff have to put into ChatGPT to get that image?”

She concluded, “Maybe that's worth a FOIA request — I'm genuinely curious. But he is the one who keeps putting out this imagery, like: I am a God, worship me, I was made for this time.”

But conservative columnist Jim Geraghty argued that Trump supporters will not waver in their backing of him because his appeal rests in a cult of personality.

“I would argue it’s more of a pugnacious attitude with a handful of immovable north stars (immigration enforcement, tariffs, disregard for multilateralism) and every other policy decision negotiable — up to and including the federal government taking an ownership stake and some degree of control over private companies,” Geraghty wrote for The Washington Post. He later added that “back in January, Trump boasted, ‘MAGA is me. MAGA loves everything I do, and I love everything I do, too.’ Other than a few exceptions such as the release of the Justice Department’s Jeffrey Epstein files, that has been the case.”

For this reason, Geraghty said people should not expect mass defections from Trump’s movement.

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