A Maoist in the White House
Lloyd Green at Washington Monthly sees Chinese dictator Mao Zedong in the radical second term of Donald Trump.
“Trump [is] doing his best Mao impersonation,” Green writes. “Like Mao, Trump upends the U.S. economy through diktats,” and “mounts a relentless culture war. The press, elite universities, and law firms are no longer safe. He brazenly flexes the coercive power of government to make his enemies bend the knee.”
To top it off, Trump’s incessant “joke” about a third term is now unveiled as a serious threat against constitutionally-imposed presidential term limits. Trump has brazenly indicated he would skirt the 22nd Amendment through unspecified “methods [by] which you could do it.”
Trump’s thirst for power and domination likely won’t stop there.
“THIS IS AN ECONOMIC REVOLUTION,” Trump declared in an online post about his disastrous and “historic” tariff crusade.
Similarly, Elon Musk, the man behind the White House curtain, has called his Trump-approved DOGE “the biggest revolution in the government since the original [American] revolution.” Mind you, DOGE is “e-god” backwards, and it is being used to spy on federal workers to weed out dissent. “Big Brother,” anyone?
(For what it’s worth, did anyone notice that Musk said he expects annihilation from a “digital god”? And that he once proclaimed to the world, “I’m ok with going to hell”?)
Whatever Musk and Trump mean by revolutions and e-gods, MAGA is working to facilitate the deification of Trump, much like followers of Mao or Kim.
Chairman Mao gained power by fostering a cult of personality based on an image of infallible wisdom. An atheist, Mao attempted to scrub God from society and turn adoration toward himself and communism. According to China Daily, “Mao used to be deified into a near-saint—the Great Helmsman who was ‘always correct.’” Even after the destructive effects of his policies were made unmistakable, Mao continues to be respected as a “revolutionary romantic.”
After endorsing him in 2024, Elon Musk stoked fear and called Trump “the only way” to save the country: “Very few Americans realize that, if Trump is NOT elected, this will be the last election. Far from being a threat to democracy, he is the only way to save it!”
During Trump’s March 4th speech to Congress, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene wore a hat that read, “TRUMP WAS RIGHT ABOUT EVERYTHING!” The full effect of Trump’s “revolutionary” and “always correct” policies are yet to be seen, but we have a hint in the stock market.
For now, one wonders what Brendan Carr, FCC chair, was thinking when he sported a Mao-like loyalty pin of Trump’s head on his lapel, in place of a U.S. flag.
Weeks after Trump sent a horde of supporters to the U.S. Capitol to “stop the steal” (as in, “war is peace”), Republicans rallied to the former president at CPAC, where they posed for pictures with a cartoonish golden statue of his likeness.
The January 6th attack (“day of love”) was an authoritarian attempt by Trump to disrupt Congress and remain in power. It was an intended coup. Cops were assaulted under Blue Lives Matter flags. People died. The Capitol was besieged for the first time since the War of 1812, now by U.S. citizens. Congress was forced into hiding, suspending its constitutionally-mandated certification duties for several hours. The peaceful transfer of office took its first-ever hit, as the rule of law bent momentarily to a rabid mob invited by the president of the United States.
Despite all of this, Republicans gave cover, such as at CPAC, and thereby enabled Trump the unlikely pursuit of a second term. Since the day they laughed off the insurrection and posed with a golden statue, Republicans have stuck with Trump, through indictments and a conviction. A lawless felon is their patriot.
Such blind and mystifying loyalty was visualized during the Capitol siege in a Trump/Rambo flag portraying the nearly 80-year-old man saving the world with a rocket launcher. While Congress fled, and police bled.
Chairman Mao, son of a wealthy farmer, had an improbable rise. A nobody, he dabbled in communistic thought, and soon learned to idolize power-mongering Napoleon Bonaparte, a master of self-promotion. Mao employed the Bonaparte’s PR tactics and let propaganda create his reality.
It’s almost as though Mao absorbed The Power of Positive Thinking, by Trump’s mentor, Norman Vincent Peale: “BELIEVE IN YOURSELF! Have faith in your abilities!” At all costs!
Although Mao caused the deaths of an estimated 42.5 million people, his high esteem continues. In 2013, a $16 million gold statue marked the communist leader’s 120th birthday.
A few years later, a village in Tongxu, the “epicenter” of Mao’s famine, began constructing a 120 ft gold statue to tower all other human monuments. It was later demolished for lack of proper approval—or aesthetics.
MAGA seems to have drawn inspiration from idolatrous fan art—rather than the Bible. To enshrine Trump as a fighting “patriot,” an admirer created a 15-ft bronze statue with a raised fist, in time for the second inauguration. Dubbed “Don Colossus,” it depicts Trump after his assassination attempt, when he arose and shouted, “fight, fight, fight.” Who we’re supposed to fight is unclear.
Trump has never been one to refuse adulation. As president of the United States, he shared an AI-generated fantasy video featuring a gold statue of himself.
Whether by glorified imagery or graven images, the felonious president is worshiped without shame by MAGA. Trump occasionally participates in his own deification. During his trial, he shared messages comparing himself to Jesus, along with an image of Jesus sitting at his left.
At other times, the serial adulterer—who, by the way, previously said he didn’t think adultery is a sin—has portrayed himself as essentially sinless. “I mean, why do I have to, you know, repent? Why do I have to ask for forgiveness if you are not making mistakes? I work hard. I'm an honorable person,” Trump said during his 2016 campaign.
Aside from the sacrilege and self-idolatry, is there anything ideological that makes Trump worthy of a comparison to Mao?
Since 2016, exhaustive documentation has shown that Trump has a noticeable affinity for dictators and communists. Then, in his first term, President Trump celebrated Chinese communism by tweeting: “Congratulations to President Xi and the Chinese people on the 70th Anniversary of the People’s Republic of China!”
Republican leaders at the time were aghast, with Rep. Liz Cheney, Rep. Chip Roy, and Sen. Tom Cotton publicly at odds with the president’s glee. To make matters worse, Trump froze funds that were designated to help anti-communist protesters in Hong Kong, after he promised President Xi silence about the protests.
For a Republican president to go out of his way to stand with Chinese communism may have seemed out-of-place. Yet anyone who was paying attention to past Trump statements would know it was not the first time. Specifically, he once lauded the Chinese government for the massacre at Tiananmen Square.
“When the students poured into Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government almost blew it. Then they were vicious, they were horrible, but they put it down with strength. That shows you the power of strength,” Trump told Playboy Magazine in 1990.
Have you ever heard anyone else talk this way?
To make matters worse, Trump made the remark in criticism of Mikhail Gorbachev for not using violence to keep the Soviet Union together. Trump said: “Russia is out of control and the leadership knows it. That’s my problem with Gorbachev. Not a firm enough hand.” He was saying the Soviets should respond to the anti-communist movement “with strength,” as did the Chinese.
In the same article, Trump sounded like Elon Musk or Chairman Mao in nihilistic anticipation: “Life is what you do while you’re waiting to die. . . . . We’re here and we live our sixty, seventy or eighty years and we’re gone. You win, you win, and in the end, it doesn’t mean a h*** of a lot. But it is something to do—to keep you interested.” He then said “every successful person has a very large ego.” Asked whether that included Jesus Christ and Mother Teresa, Trump retorted that they had “far greater egos than you will ever understand.”
While not enough time has passed to make a full one-to-one comparison with Mao, it’s true that Trump echoed the mindset of a dictator when he posted: “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.”
After criticism, Trump doubled-down and re-posted the quote, this time attributed to Napoleon, Mao’s hero. It was actually a line for Napoleon in the Soviet-produced movie Waterloo.
Like Mao, Trump has shown a disregard for law, reality, and human life. As we speak, non-criminals are suffering a life sentence in a cramped foreign prison, without a trial, used for photo-ops like animals in a cage, at the expense of U.S. taxpayers. Trump says he would be “honored” to send American inmates to El Salvador. And, although Congress alone has the constitutional power of the purse, Trump has abruptly halted aid for several countries, without concern for the loss of life that may result. Meanwhile, one wonders what kind of deprivation Trump has in store for the U.S., with sky-rocketing costs and lack of production.
What does the scripture say?
“When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; But when a wicked man rules, the people groan.” (Proverbs 29:2, NKJV)