Trump has left us questioning what’s left and what’s right this week

As the election draws nearer, it’s become harder to see where the president really stands — and some of his key allies seem to be turning against him, Holly Baxter writes

Is Trump a true conservative? And is Biden liberal enough to clean up the mess he made? (AFP via Getty)

What makes a liberal and what makes a conservative? Once upon a time, the answer to that question would have been straightforward. In the US these days, however, everything is becoming a little less clear-cut.

Take Donald Trump, for instance. Most of us would say his Republican credentials make him a conservative. He talks about being “pro-life” (anti-abortion) and poses with bibles outside churches, even if he has to clear protesters out the way with tear gas to do it. He opposes big government and he’s hardline on immigration. His “America First” policy even led him to direct the US to buy up almost the entire world’s supply of antiviral drug remdesivir this week in the face of skyrocketing numbers of American coronavirus cases.

But not everybody thinks Trump is a conservative. Voices contributor Bonny Brooks argued this week that he barely counts at all now, considering his supporters within the Republican party refused to pass a piece of legislation if it included wording that would have mandated presidential campaigns to report whether they knew of foreign entities meddling in future elections. Bonny was clear when she spoke to me about that: flag-waving and “sham patriotism” is all very well, she said, but this stood against everything conservatives hold dear. And she’s not the only one who thinks that – if you go by the advertising campaign of Never-Trumper conservative group The Lincoln Project, whose commercials have become an increasing source of national discussion. Trump’s praising of Putin and Xi Jinping and his refusal to properly address claims that Russia may have meddled in the 2016 election – and may be planning to do so again – have stretched some lifelong GOP members’ patience a little too far.

One of Trump’s key campaign promises in 2016 was to pack the Supreme Court with conservative judges; he even made allusions to overthrowing Roe v Wade – the court case which made abortion legal in the United States – that way. True to his word, the president has taken every opportunity to put Republican-leaning judges into the court, but it hasn’t all gone the way he might have imagined. Earlier this week, conservative chief justice Roberts voted against a law which would have made abortion effectively illegal in Louisiana.

And a couple of weeks earlier, he and fellow conservative chief justice Gorsuch both sided with liberals to block the legalisation of employment discrimination against LGBT people. Both decisions were unexpected, and were met with surprise and delight by many liberal campaigners. Ever since Brett Kavanaugh was sworn in as a Supreme Court judge despite being accused of rape by Christine Blasey Ford, the feeling has been that the court is as partisan under Trump as the rest of American politics. These rare moments of collaboration may give us a glimmer of hope about what’s to come – but, as my department’s regular writer Noah Berlatsky argues, it’s also nowhere near enough.

Elsewhere, accusations of Russian bounties on American soldiers’ heads have rumbled on. DC writer and White House frequenter Andrew Feinberg wrote on Tuesday about the worry among intelligence officials that Trump seems more concerned about the damaging news reports than the details of them. The president is still claiming that he “wasn’t briefed” about the threat, even though some within his administration deny it. And as the president continues to stay oddly quiet on the Black Lives Matter movement, polls show most Americans support it; a significant amount of Republican politicians have taken note, despite the disinterest of their leader, and begun to distance themselves from his reactions. It doesn’t help that Trump’s polling numbers are falling a little too far down than his allies might like with an election on the horizon.

When you listen to the president speak, it’s often hard to tell what’s up or down – was he really “being sarcastic” when he said UV light and bleach might prevent or cure coronavirus? Did he really not hear the man shouting, “White power!” in that video he tweeted out over the weekend? – and we’re used to being discombobulated in that way. He likes to keep reporters on their toes. But now we’re entering new territory, as everyone gets a little more worried about November: it’s hard to tell what’s right or left. Who is the real conservative, and, as Democrats themselves split into progressives-versus-pragmatists factions, which liberal isn’t liberal enough to beat the confusing current occupant of the Oval Office?

The answers aren’t simple, and they aren’t easy to find – but they will reveal themselves as the weeks go on.

Yours,

Holly Baxter

US opinion editor