United States • 🌿 Progressive

Trump targets Democratic voters with communist label from Ankara

Trump targets Democratic voters with communist label from Ankara

Trump used the NATO summit in Ankara to revive anti-communist attacks against Democratic candidates following socialist primary victories in New York and…

As economic anxiety continues to shape American politics, President Donald Trump chose the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, to relaunch a messaging campaign that labels Democratic candidates as communists — a strategy researchers say is designed to stigmatize voters and communities drawn to left-wing candidates before November's midterms. "What's forming is communism," Trump said at the Beştepe Presidential Compound, in remarks that according to NPR carried as much weight with audiences back home as with foreign leaders gathered for the summit. 🔹 What happened: According to NPR, Trump, who recently turned 80, declared that communism is the greatest threat America has faced since its founding and said it is "easy to sell." He also compared his own persuasive capacity to that of Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin. The remarks follow primary victories by democratic socialist candidates in New York and Colorado, and echo language Trump used last month at the Faith & Freedom Coalition conference, where he claimed that a communist government would close churches and "kill your people." Jennifer Stromer-Galley, a political messaging researcher at Syracuse University, said Trump is deliberately conflating democratic socialists with communism. Presidential historian Tevi Troy linked Trump's rhetoric to his 1950s upbringing and to Roy Cohn, his mentor, who worked on Senator McCarthy's anti-communist staff. 🔹 Why it matters: Workers and lower-income voters in the New York and Colorado districts where socialist candidates won primaries now face a sustained messaging campaign that frames their electoral choices as un-American. The 2024 precedent is documented: Trump used the "Comrade Kamala" label against then-Vice President Harris and circulated a digitally altered image showing her in front of communist flags. That cycle showed that the label, once attached, is difficult to remove before Election Day. Young voters and uninsured workers who supported those primary candidates are most directly exposed to the stigmatizing effect of the campaign. The religious freedom framing — "they will close your churches" — adds a second pressure point targeting faith communities. 📌 EPM Take: The uncomfortable truth that progressive outlets avoid is that the strategy has a factual anchor. The candidates who won primaries in New York and Colorado are self-identified democratic socialists — not communists, but close enough in the American political vocabulary of 1950s-era red-baiting, which Roy Cohn helped write and Trump absorbed firsthand. Stromer-Galley's analysis is accurate, but incomplete: conflation only works when voters lack a concrete, competing narrative. The candidates who won those primaries have yet to dominate a single news cycle with a specific policy proposal — on housing, wages, or healthcare — that would shift the conversation away from labels. If that vacuum persists through October, Trump's framing will not need to be accurate. It will only need to be louder.
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