What Voters Have Learned Since 2016 About the Real Donald Trump
2020 is going to be different from 2016 not just because of what’s happening but because of what we now know about the GOP presidential nominee
When Donald Trump ran for president in 2016, his personal history as a thrice-married former pro-choice Democrat from New York City campaigning as a Republican allowed people to project onto him an array of views. He was hailed for being a “dove.” He was taken seriously as a candidate with “more acceptable views” on LGBTQ+ rights than the rest of his party. He was called a “textbook example of an ideological moderate.” What was known about him was largely based on his own self-mythologizing — coupled with the skillful editing of the reality TV shows that made him a household name. His pitch was that he was a self-made billionaire real estate mogul, who would run the U.S. government like a business.
More than five years since he announced his bid for the White House, we know a lot more about who he is — and who he actually was all along. Indeed, Americans have learned more about who Trump really is since he became president than during his decades-long stint in the public eye — and certainly more than they learned from the press while he was running for president.
