1.

2 Donald Trump’s Mount Rushmore speech: a rhetorical

analysis

Donald Trump’s Mount Rushmore speech can only be describe as the

fascist climax of the instrumentation of culture war. This speech is

trying to install a new mythology of the creation of the United States

of America.

Seventeen seventy-six represented the culmination of thousands of

years of western civilization and the triumph not only of spirit, but of
wisdom, philosophy, and reason.

And yet, as we meet here tonight, there is a growing danger that

threatens every blessing our ancestors fought so hard for, struggled,
they bled to secure.

Our nation is witnessing a merciless campaign to wipe out our

history, defame our heroes, erase our values, and indoctrinate our
children.

AUDIENCE: Booo —

THE PRESIDENT: Angry mobs are trying to tear down statues of

our Founders, deface our most sacred memorials, and unleash a wave
of violent crime in our cities. Many of these people have no idea why
they are doing this, but some know exactly what they are doing. They
think the American people are weak and soft and submissive. But no,
the American people are strong and proud, and they will not allow our
country, and all of its values, history, and culture, to be taken from
them. (Applause.)

In this mythology the creation of United States is simply put at the

center of every meaningful event in western Civilization. It is seen as

it’s climax and installs it as a multi-millennia project. This

paternalistic project must speak about it’s founding fathers in order to

say that their memorials are ‘sacred’. This mythological origin must

now be defended as in a crusade against mortal ennemies. In Ur-

fascism, Umberto Eco says that “Thus, by a continuous shifting of

rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too

weak”. This is why Donald Trump describes them as both ‘Merciless’

but with part of them not knowing why they are protesting. There is a

merciless enemy and their pawns. The protesters are framed as un-

American by putting them in opposition to the American People who

is not weak but strong. This is Fascism 101, this small excerpt uses a

lot of classical fascist rhetorical tactics. The deeply ironic remark

made by Donald Trump is the attack on Black Lives Matter when the

president assimilates them to: “... a new far-left fascism that demands

absolute allegiance.”. During a fascist speech Donald Trump is

accusing others of fascism because fascism is about being strong and

then to not be bothered with reality. (quote sebastien mort to show

that it is a conservative thing). When Donald Trump says the

American culture is superior it combines with the exclusion of the

protesters’ Americanism in order to create a rhetorical equation.

Americans are superiors, protestors are not Americans, since

Americans are superiors then non-Americans are inferiors: Protestors

are inferiors. It is important to keep in mind the context of this

speech: Racial tension with protest made up overwhelmingly of black

people. It is important also to describe his audience: A crushing

majority of White people. (quote something from the white theology

part of lisa). So the rhetorical equation can easily be understood by

replacing protestors with African-Americans. Trump to some of his

audience is implying that African-Americans are inferiors and not

Americans. When Trump says: “people who damage or deface federal

statues or monuments will get a minimum of 10 years in prison.” It is

a political machismo way to show force to his audience. It doesn’t

matter if the Supreme Court of the United States decides at a later

point to overturn the executive order installing these sentencing

policies. The executive order is only here for the optics, for the

spectacle, for the pleasure and feelings of his base( quote lisa) In a

fascist manner that leaves no place for complexity or grey areas, and

with a reference to the law of nature which is very endearing to

fascists Donald Trump adds: “Against every law of society and

nature, our children are taught in school to hate their own country, and

to believe that the men and women who built it were not heroes, but

that were villains.” The anti-intellectualism of this claim is a fascist

way to interpret history and to create another mythological

foundational history. This mythological foundation is an answer to his

base’s “Obsessive preoccupation with community decline,

humiliation, or victimhood” and in answer offers compensatory cults

of unity, energy, and purity”(Paxton) This is in line with Paxton’s

definition of Fascism. The speech continues by naming qualities and

personalities that Donald Trump links to American Greatness this is a

blatant ‘cult of tradition’ as described by Umberto Eco. In an

adaptation of the second point of Umberto Eco’s list of qualities

attached to fascism the rejection of intellectualism and post-

modernism has been made clear with the rejection of a more nuanced

history of the United States of America. In this speech by rejecting the

Americanism of the protectors Trump is implying that disagreement

with his mythological America is treason as described in the fourth

point of Umberto Eco’s list. The Fear of Difference was used by

Donald Trump in order to depict the protesters as ‘leftist and

anarchists’. The appeal to social frustration of White people towards

the desecration of their heroes is clear. The idea that Americanism

being transformed as the most important privilege by putting it above

any other culture is also present and is linked to the 10th point of

Umberto Eco’s list saying that fascists will tell their followers that

they are part of the greatest people on earth. Donald Trump near the

end of the Mount Rushmore speech says: “And we will teach our

children to know that they live in a land of legends, that nothing can

stop them, and that no one can hold them down.” Which is a literal

translation of educating everybody to become a hero. The selective

populism is heavily developed through the exclusion of of protesters

from the American people. And last but not least the use of an

impoverished vocabulary, and an elementary syntax are now essential

aspect of Donald Trump.

This speech was clearly a Fascist speech and the use of Fascist

rhetoric has not escaped the keen eye of academics as shown in the

LISA revue on trumpism

Jérôme Viala-Gaudefroy analyse cette rhétorique et en décode les

tropes. Donald Trump, en tant que président, est conteur-en-chef de la
nation états-unienne. Sa communication se fonde sur différents
mythes héroïques, dont celui de la puissance. En refusant d’adosser
celle-ci à la vertu, et substituant la notion de violence à celle de
justice, il flatte sa base électorale. Les deux articles suivants
démontrent que Trump accentue les clivages à dessein, n’hésitant pas
à avoir recours au racisme. Serge Ricard démontre combien celui-ci
imprègne le quotidien de la nation américaine. Son article nous
rappelle que si l’Amérique d’Obama fit belle part à un scénario post-
racial, il s’agit là d’une exception dans l’histoire des États-Unis, où le
racisme observé sous Trump n’est qu’un retour à l’état normal. Cette
technique que l’on pensait d’un autre âge fait malheureusement
pleinement recette encore
aujourd’hui. S. Romi Mukherjee analyse, pour sa part, les mythes mis
à l’oeuvre par Trump à la fois pour parler à son électorat, mais
également pour donner une direction à son équipe au sein de la
 Maison Blanche. Le sociologue des religions voit en l’utilisation de
ces mythes une théologie politique raciste, qui s’inscrit elle-même
dans une longue tradition américaine.

In this abstract made for the revue by Pierre Guerlain et Raphaël

Ricaud it is said that Trump’s rhetoric is used consciously in order to

rally up his base and to give a political compass to his cabinet. In the

next part of this memoir will be discussed the actions of Donald

Trump and his cabinet in order to see if his fascist rhetoric is linked to

fascist policies and political behavior.