The worst president in American history is again comparing himself to the best. But that is nothing new – Propaganda works through the endless repetition of untruths.
Last week, during his now infamous appearance at the National Association of Black Journalists convention in Chicago, Donald Trump first questioned the ethnicity of Vice President Kamala Harris and then literally claimed that Harris was “the best president for the black people since Abraham Lincoln.”
Trump began comparing himself to Lincoln at least four years ago. During the 2020 campaign, he began regularly telling us that Lincoln was a Republican – his extremely endearing way of explaining in a boyish way a fundamental and well-known fact that he thinks he has discovered.
During this campaign against Joe Biden, Trump started saying that he, like Lincoln, had been treated terribly by the press and probably belonged up there on Mount Rushmore with Lincoln and the other great leaders. (I don’t think he could name the other three.)
To bolster this specious comparison, Trump’s now-deposed Vice President Mike Pence, a native of Indiana – where Lincoln spent most of his early life, was brought in. He recorded a tense, somber video, as I recall, at the site of Lincoln’s cabin in Spencer County. The video appears to have been deleted from the internet, but was widely featured in the news at the time.
In an interview with Fox News that same year, Trump boasted that he had done more for “the black community” than any other president except Perhaps Lincoln, on the other hand, called the “end result” “questionable.” (I have no idea what he meant, but neither possibility is good.)
In the same interview, Trump helpfully noted that Lincoln had a nickname: According to the most successful liar in the history of US politics, Abraham Lincoln was “Honest Abe, as we call it.” In the face of massive defeats in civil and criminal cases, Trump actually tried to call himself “Honest Don” earlier this year.
Schoolchildren learning about the Civil War should first study Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address of November 19, 1863, and then, if they dare, listen to Trump’s incoherent, off-the-cuff “Gettysburg! Wow!” speech he gave there last April, in which he briefly adopted a pseudo-Irish accent while supposedly “quoting Robert E. Lee, who is no longer in favor of it.”
At a campaign rally in Iowa in January, Trump said he could have reflected on how Lincoln was outdone by negotiating an unspecified solution to the Civil War. “There were so many mistakes made. Look, I think there was something that could have been negotiated, to be honest,” he said. Of that brotherly slaughter that cost more than half a million American lives, Trump said, “It was, I don’t know, it was just different. I just think it was – I’m so excited to see it.” Sounds a lot like Lincoln to me!
Trump’s absurd comparisons to Lincoln are, of course, just one example of his poor-me whining and history-less nonsense that comes out of his mouth 24/7 and continues into his third campaign, with which he is sowing discord and distrust among Americans.
During a typically tense exchange at the NABJ event in Chicago, Trump was asked about Republicans’ claims that Harris is “a DEI candidate” — something he himself had implied without actually saying. He called such questions “rude and mean.” (In a recent appearance on David Pakman’s show, attorney and Lincoln Project founder George Conway quipped that Trump is the real DEI candidate: deranged, egomaniacal and incompetent.)
After writing about Trump’s odd self-comparisons to Lincoln in 2020, I thought that it might actually be Joe Biden who bears some resemblance to our 16th president, who spoke so poignantly of the better angels of our nature and tried to unite a broken country. Biden would never make such a comparison, but I think it has only gotten stronger.
Biden has tried to be, like Lincoln, a president for all Americans in terribly troubled times. Despite the hatred and criticism of his opponents, Biden has managed to push through several important pieces of legislation, most notably the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act, all of which bring critical jobs and investment to rural counties (most of which did not support him). Like the president he served under before him, Biden has made it clear that he does not want to see a “red” or “blue” America, potentially damaging him politically.
Donald Trump has never tried to appeal to all Americans or really care about their economic needs. He just wants their votes, even if it kills them. His only goal is self-aggrandizement, although he obviously enjoys discrediting and destroying our democracy.
No serious American historian would describe Trump’s behavior during his chaotic occupation of the White House as LincolnesqueIf anything, he seemed to act more often as the President of the Confederacy would.
Not only does Biden have a deep respect for the rule of law and understand how important it is for all Americans to be able to govern, but he is most similar to Lincoln because both men suffered so much in their lives. The experience of tragedy and grief almost always deepens a person’s empathy and tests their faith. That was certainly the case with Lincoln and Biden.
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Three of Abraham and Mary Lincoln’s four sons died, one of them during their tenure in the White House. Lincoln lost his mother when he was nine years old. In 1972, Biden lost his first wife, Nielia, and their one-year-old daughter, Naomi, in a car accident that also seriously injured his sons Beau and Hunter. Beau Biden died of cancer in 2015 at the age of 46, which was perhaps the main reason Joe Biden did not run for president the following year.
George Saunders’ Lincoln in the Bardo is a brilliant fictional exploration of Lincoln’s incomprehensible grief over the loss of his son Willie. We know that Biden grieves every time he visits a cemetery and inevitably thinks of Beau. (Remember a Trump spokesman who mocked the Bidens’ cemetery visit on Memorial Day? We definitely should.)
Donald Trump seems pathologically incapable of expressing grief or compassion, even when those closest to him die. He reportedly went to the movies while his older brother Fred was dying in hospital. He buried his first wife, Ivana, behind the first tee of his New Jersey golf course, possibly for tax evasion.
Whatever his faults, Joe Biden is a quiet, humble, thoughtful, generous, profoundly decent and good-humored man – qualities he shares with Lincoln, whose character was forged in poverty, struggle, grief and lonely occupation. He, too, was known for his humor, which was often seen as a clear sign of intelligence.
Trump possesses none of these qualities and does not seem to understand humor, beyond the low art of mocking others and complaining like an old man about things like low water pressure in the toilet. Amanda Marcotte of Salon writes, “Trump is not a fan of women laughing, which is no doubt one reason his wife rarely smiles.” For those not part of his cult, Trump is sometimes inadvertently Sure, it’s funny, but almost always in an embarrassing way.
Biden recently secured the release of dissidents and political prisoners from Putin’s custody – another success for a presidency that began in the worst month of the Covid pandemic.
During our nation’s most contentious era, Lincoln was an unwavering believer in the Union and urged Americans to see each other as friends, not enemies. As we have heard many times over the past four years – and during his White House torch-passing speech – Biden also has an unwavering belief in America’s unique strengths. He warns us, “History is in your hands.”
What I couldn’t possibly have known when I previously wrote about Trump’s ridiculous and self-serving comparisons to Lincoln was how Biden would be viewed by presidential historians. Of course, his term isn’t over yet, but that mindset is starting to take hold.
Lincoln always tops such lists, but historians already recognize Biden as a great president, placing him 14th, ahead of Woodrow Wilson and Ronald Reagan. By another yardstick, “overall greatness,” Biden stands shoulder to shoulder with John Adams, our second president. His recent negotiations to release hostages, dissidents and political prisoners held by Vladimir Putin are another of his many accomplishments during a presidency that began in the worst month of the COVID pandemic, a disaster outrageously mishandled by the previous president, who also refused to accept his own defeat in a free and fair election.
Trump constantly boasts about being the best president ever – remember what I said about repetition and propaganda – but he knows that he ranks at or near the bottom even among historians who call themselves conservative. He was completely unqualified, he was impeached twice, he tried to incite an insurrection, he was convicted of paying hush money and sexual assault, and he still faces a litany of criminal charges that I hardly need to list here.
After more than half a century of distinguished service as Senator, Vice President, and now President, Joe Biden’s legacy as a public servant will end with his selfless decision to pass the torch to Kamala Harris and end his single, remarkably successful term in office. This may well be the act for which he will be most honored.
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by Kirk Swearingen on Trump, Biden and 2024
