Trump declares victory, no matter what, Iran war is the latest example of that
“It wasn’t always this easy,” he said in a voice-over, noting that by the late 1980s he was “in serious trouble” and “billions of dollars in debt.”
This is one of the few times Trump has publicly acknowledged his failure. Even then, he was reading a script intended to give audiences an identity against all odds, highlighting the combative charisma that would inform a political career a decade later.
In his current narrative, Trump never loses.
Even when he is clearly defeated, as in the 2020 election, Trump declares victory so often that his supporters believe him. He knows the power of repetition.
Also Read: Trump says Iran and US reaching deal ‘won’t make any difference’ to him
“For him, the world is divided into winners and losers. And he’s always the winner,” said John Bolton, a national security adviser during Trump’s first term. Will the Supreme Court strike down his signature tariffs? Trump has vowed to work around the court to ensure import tariffs are “used in a much more powerful and obnoxious way.”
The Justice Department stops appealing court decisions blocking executive orders aimed at punishing big law firms, then reverses course and renews those legal battles after reports of no appeal appeared to be an admission of defeat.
Eric, one of the president’s sons, said his father “never felt the need to project a ‘winning image.’ He is the definition of a winner, based on what he has built and accomplished.”
But never has the risk of victory been greater for the Republican president than in the war with Iran, in which he declared victory within days. Tehran has repeatedly repeated this claim even as it continues to strike US and its allies’ targets and spread economic pain around the world by blocking the Strait of Hormuz.
With the ceasefire now in effect, Trump says the United States has achieved its goals. But reality does not prove this.
“Whether things go well or not, that’s not going to stop him from declaring victory. That’s baked into the cake now,” Bolton said.
‘This was the message strategy’
Sarah Matthews, the former first-term Trump White House deputy press secretary who resigned after a mob of Trump supporters rioted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, said the president “will not allow his ego to admit defeat.”
“That was the messaging strategy,” Matthews said of his time in the White House. “It was, ‘How can we redefine this loss as victory?'”
Current White House spokesman Davis Ingle said Trump “consistently reflects proudly on our country’s unique greatness in his public comments.”
Also Read: Trump warns of ‘big problems’ if China sends weapons to Iran
Trump’s identification of failures as gains can be traced back to his early days as a real estate developer. In 1973, federal authorities sued Trump and his father, alleging racial discrimination in the rental of apartments their company built in Brooklyn and Queens, two boroughs of New York City.
The Trumps were encouraged to file a countersuit by Roy Cohn, a notorious lawyer who gained notoriety as an aggressive supporter of Senator Joseph McCarthy’s “red scare” hearings in the 1950s.
The case was settled two years later after both parties signed an agreement prohibiting the Trumps from “discriminating against any person.” Trump declared victory by stating that no wrongdoing was admitted, even though the Justice Department called the deal “one of the most far-reaching agreements ever negotiated.”
David Cay Johnston, author of “The Making of Donald Trump,” said Cohn “taught Donald never to compromise as much as a comma.”
“Whatever position you take, that’s the position, and anyone who challenges you is wrong. They’re disgusting. They’re incompetent. They’re stupid,” Johnston said. Bankruptcies did not tarnish Trump’s image
Over the years, Trump has consistently lost money on his business ventures, launching unsuccessful product lines that include steak, bottled water, vodka, a magazine, an airline, a home mortgage lender, and online courses known as Trump University.
Barbara Res, who worked for the future president for nearly two decades, recalls pitting top executives against each other to ensure he remained his company’s strongest voice even as losses mounted.
These experiences have informed today’s Trump, who has said that “if it helps him, it’s all right with him.”
Robert Thompson, professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University, said the success of “The Apprentice” was based on earlier factors. These included the conceit in the title of Trump’s 1987 book “The Art of the Deal,” as well as his aggressive manipulation of media attention and his obsession with naming buildings after himself.
“When you need someone to represent the ‘Rich American Man’ quickly and efficiently, Trump has put himself in that position, and everyone else has gone along with it,” Thompson said, adding that once that happens, “the actual ups and downs of his portfolio don’t matter that much.”
After his three casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey, failed, Trump insisted to The Associated Press in 2016 that “Atlantic City was a great time for me.”‘You create your own reality’
After losing the 2016 Republican Iowa caucus, Trump posted that Texas Sen. Ted Cruz “illegally stole.” Trump went on to win the presidency but lost the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton in November, which he said he actually caught up with “if you take out the millions of people who voted illegally.”
Russell Muirhead, a professor at Dartmouth College who has written about Trump’s chaotic governing style, said Trump has been in practice “long enough to live in a world where you create your own reality.”
Even the way Trump plays golf is about winning, at least on his own properties, where he boasts multiple club championships and no second-place finishes.
Trump says he’s won 38 times at golf clubs. This includes a 2018 tournament in West Palm Beach, Florida, in which he did not play and only claimed victory after dominating the next match. Trump also claimed the senior title at the same course in 2023 despite missing the first round of the event, listing a previous scoring shot at the same course instead.
Johnston said Trump “has this fictional narrative in his head” and is “like a screenwriter. When you need to change the narrative, you just change it.”
