Donald Trump’s Guide to Winning Elections

Love him or hate him, there’s no denying Donald Trump knows how to run a political campaign. He was elected once (even though he lost the popular vote), almost elected a second time (lost by only a few thousand votes in a few swing States), will likely be the Republican nominee for 2024 and, according to a January CNN poll, has a good chance at beating Biden to become the 47th President of the United States! Not too bad for a guy who’s been impeached twice, is currently facing 91 charges across four criminal cases, including trying to subvert democracy, risking national security secrets and falsifying business records in connection with a hush money payment to a porn actress.

If this guy can be President, then so can you. The following guide is easy, free, and, more than anything, Donald Trump has proved it worked for him. What are you waiting for? Let your Presidential aspirations begin!

Become a Republican (if you’re not already)

When running for President, it’s important to know your voter because they’re the ones ultimately responsible for the 270 electoral votes you’ll need to win. The Electoral College is the group of presidential electors required by the Constitution to form every four years for the sole purpose of voting for the president of the United States. You can try juicing your electoral count by installing fake electors to lie and cheat for you, but this can be tricky if you get caught. Several Trump supporters are currently being tried for this.

In terms of audience, stick to white, working-class rural folks. While you may argue that our society is more diverse than that, the truth is you don’t need minorities or gays to win. Most of them are Democrats anyway.

Don’t knock it, being a Republican has its advantages. For example, because they have such a tenuous grip on power in Washington, they will always have your back no matter how offensive your actions have been. Sure, there were a few Republicans who chastised Trump for January 6th, but as he gets closer to being the presumptive nominee, they’re all kissing the ring now.

Social Media is Your Friend

Social media is your mouthpiece to the World when the media isn’t talking about you. Social media is where you can float half-baked ideas, like when Trump said, “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” And it’s where you telegraph support for right-wing fringe groups like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers who will defend you and carry out your commands when called upon. You must constantly publish stream of consciousness posts no matter how outrageous. Who can forget the May 2017 Trump tweet, "Despite the constant negative press covfefe". That insanely incoherent message was picked up by every news outlet in the country! P.T. Barnum said it best, “There's no such thing as bad publicity, as long as they spell your name right.” Remember when posting, it’s not about being right or wrong, it’s about keeping your name in the public’s consciousness 24/7/365.

Know Your Challengers

Early in your campaign, you should know who your biggest challengers are. Starting with your smallest threats, begin denigrating them publicly by giving them insulting nicknames. Crooked Hilary Clinton, Crazy Nancy, Sleepy Joe, Lyin’ Ted, Liddle Mike Pence are great examples that resonated with Trump followers.

Hold off attacking your larger threats, because their endorsements closer to election day are what’s going to turn those swing state fence sitters into votes for you. In exchange, promise to endorse them for any office they run for when you win the Presidency. If larger opponents trash talk you publicly, then you have permission to give them a humiliating nickname and publicly ridicule them as a warning to others not to cross you.

Identify Your Platform

Now that you’ve registered as a Republican and filled out the required paperwork to officially run for office, you need to develop a platform that separates you from your opponents. The following isn’t an exhaustive list, but it’s enough to get you going.

• Immigrants: Republicans think immigrants are coming for their jobs, stealing their healthcare, and selling drugs. Use this fear to your benefit and be bold. Look how much attention Trump received when he suggested implementing a ban on Muslims entering the country, or when he threatened to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico that they were going to pay for.
• Gun legislation: If there’s anything that’ll turn a Republican against you, it’s gun control. Stay away from this lighting rod or you will lose the election. What you should do instead is host a campaign rally at NRA headquarters. Defending the Second Amendment will also get the NRA to loosen its purse strings and help fund your campaign! And if there’s a mass shooting while you’re defending the right to bear arms, refer to the standard “thoughts and prayers” script and remind people that guns don’t kill people, people kill people.
• Abortion: This is a tricky one. Most Red States in the southern half of the country are God-fearing Christians. That’s why they call that region the bible belt. As such, many of them don’t believe a woman has the right to decide what she can do with her body. But more women are speaking up against the government meddling with their bodies. You need to be nuanced. For example, it’s okay to say publicly that a woman should have the right to choose, but also be sure to signal to the other half about the anti-abortion judges you plan to install once you’re elected.
• Taxes: Saying Republicans hate taxes is an understatement. No matter their socioeconomic position in society, all Republicans believe they pay too many taxes. They believe taxes are used to make the government bigger. No Republican politician in recent memory ever won office by promising to raise taxes.
• Unions: Unions are for Democrats. Democrats believe in helping people get a leg up by improving their wages. This is the antithesis of capitalism. Capitalism is about fostering competition. The free market is what made this country great! If someone doesn’t like how much they’re getting paid, they can find another job, or start their own business. If you want the wealthy to fill your coffers, you need to tell them that you’re against raising the minimum wage and you’re an avowed union buster. This signals to them more profits, which translates to larger bonuses; some of which will be directed back into your coffers.
• Healthcare: If there’s one thing that annoys Republicans to no end, it’s entitlements. It’s bad enough that our taxes must pay for the military, police and fire departments, public libraries, and roads. Should we have to pay for healthcare, too? Healthcare is expensive, and our generosity is being abused by the immigrants. Health should be an individual’s own responsibility. And if you want to add more money to your coffer, tell Big Health that you’ll do everything you can to roll back Obamacare.
• Foreign Policy: Republicans don’t like the United States always having to police the world. We spend lots of money every year trying to prop up democracy in smaller countries that don’t stand a chance of winning a war against larger neighboring countries. Your foreign policy must revolve around what’s advantageous to America. America needs to mind its own business and focus on how we can improve things at home like building more prisons. This means threatening to pull out of any ongoing agreements that were first implemented by Democrats, such as the Iran nuclear accord. Your voters will respect that you’re putting their needs before the rest of the world.

By promising to lower taxes, you kill two birds with one stone. The working class will love you because they’ll think they’re going to get more money in their paychecks. And the wealthy will love you because cutting taxes will make them wealthier than they already are. This is important because it’s the rich who will create the superPAC you need to cover your campaign expenses, luxury lifestyle, and potential legal bills. If reporters ask what services you plan to cut in exchange for lowering taxes, signal to the working class that you’re going after deadbeats like single, welfare moms who refuse to get a job and crank out babies for government checks. And to make the wealthy happy, signal to them that you’re planning to roll back environmental regulations, such as programs designed to reduce the effects of climate change.

Expect there will be a few noisy, educated, and progressive voters in your Red States, but, again, you can ignore them. What are they going to do? Write a letter to the editor or an op-ed? Your voters get their news from like-minded friends on social media and the right-wing echo chambers.

Concentrate on the Swing States

America has 50 states, and the thought of winning them all can seem daunting. To save time, ignore Blue States altogether because you’re never going to win these. You may think, “But the Blue States have more people.” That doesn’t matter. Remember, Hilary beat Trump in the popular vote but lost the electoral.

Do use the Red States to preach and build your voter base and remember these folks are big time Christians, so make sure you always have a Bible on hand, and hold it in front of the cameras so they can see you're pretending to be one of them. While it’s important to make sure the Red States are aware of what you’re doing, it’s not necessary to focus a lot of energy there. These folks would vote for Adolf Hitler if he ran as a Republican.

This brings us to the critical importance of Swing States. A Swing State is any state that could reasonably be won by either the Democratic or Republican candidate in a statewide Presidential election. This is where the magic is going to happen for you. And this is where you need to focus the lion’s share of your attention because you only need to lose one or two of these to lose the election.

Create a Catchy Tagline

People love to share. It’s what makes them feel like they’re part of something bigger. And, aside from social media, voters do that through things like bumper stickers, t-shirts, baseball caps, and beer cozies. Marketers call this stuff swag, and you better have plenty of it wherever you go and be prepared to wear it and give away large quantities of the stuff. Swag is important because it turns your followers into advertisers! Of course, swag is meaningless without a memorable tagline to go with it. “Got Milk?”, “Just do it,” “Make America Great Again”? Brilliant! “Ridin’ with Biden?” not so much. Think about something like, “Focus on America”. This signals to your base that you don’t care about what's going on anywhere else in the world and will stop spending their hard-earned money on expensive things like struggling third world nations or preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Make Bold Promises

Republicans know their party base is shrinking and they will do everything to cling to power, including turning a blind eye to the childish antics of other party members. To remain relevant, Republicans like to do things like redraw district maps and pass voter ID laws to make it harder for people of color to vote. Your voters want to know that their fears are being listened to. And they fear change, such as gay rights and switching to renewable energy.

Don’t worry about making promises you can’t keep. See Trump’s Muslim ban and his boast of repealing Obamacare as examples of legislation that never went anywhere. If your promised legislation fails, blame Congress or the courts for being roadblocks.

But don’t confuse making broad promises you can’t keep with lies. While an occasional fib is okay, you can’t make a habit of doing it all the time or you can end up like former Republican Congressional rep and fabulist George Santos, who, in an extremely rare move, was fired by more than 100 members of his own party. On a positive note, more than 100 Republicans voted against expelling him.

Cultivate Your Followers

It’s not enough to have people like you. You want them worshiping at your altar… willing to defend to the death your omnipotence to anyone daring to question your greatness. You should be able to say things like, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters” and not have anyone think you’re the slightest bit unhinged.

To help achieve that coveted cult-leader status, ask for unquestioning commitment from your voters, and punish those who question you. Dictate to your followers how you want them to act, behave, and feel. Remember, cultists are looking for someone to lead them, so be that leader. A good cult leader polarizes their followers, making them believe that it’s about “us” or “them”. Hold yourself unaccountable to anyone but yourself and project an air of infallibility. And everyone must understand that your endgame justifies the means to get there. To project forceful leadership, threaten your enemies with implied harm or legal action. Let your followers know that you will do anything in your power to get what you want including subverting the constitution and democracy itself. Don't worry if others say you’re being a dictator. Most people want to be told what to do. And if you're forceful enough in your demands, everyone will be too scared to challenge you.

Speaking of dictators, now would be a good time to ingratiate yourself with the leaders of Russia, North Korea and Venezuela. Signal to them that you like the way they think, and they’re doing a good job. They can teach you a thing or two about ruling with an iron fist after you win!

And don’t dismiss extremist groups. They can police your flock and look menacing, which makes you look more authoritative. Make sure to refer to them as “patriots,” because, like you, they think they know what’s best for America. You can imply to them that violence may be called upon, but do it in a way where if things go south and people get hurt, you can say you were just exercising your right to free speech. Otherwise, you risk the possibility of going to prison. Another advantage to befriending extremists is that they will find out where your antagonists live and send them threatening letters and bomb threats.

Now that you’ve got the white, working-class rural folks and militias in your pocket, it’s time to break out the steamroller and run over everyone standing in your way.

Disparage the Media

At this point in the campaign, you’ve probably said or done a few things that are going to upset a portion of the country. Maybe it was something you said about Muslims, gays, or Mexicans. Or maybe you got thrown out of a local theater performance for vaping and inappropriately fondling your date. And you may have been fact-checked on a few promises you’ve told during your campaign. In any event, if you’ve closely followed this guide’s instructions to this point, the media will start attacking you. And the best way to deal with these attacks is head on. Now is NOT the time to get insecure and question your qualifications for high office, because there are no qualifications for this job, except that you be 35-years old and a natural born citizen.

Anytime a reporter says something negative about you, go to your favorite social media hub, give that nasty reporter a belittling nickname and tell your followers that the media are run by a bunch of liberals out to undermine your campaign. When referencing the media, use words like “garbage”, “dishonest”, “fake news”, “unfair”, “witch hunt”, “Deep State” and “enemy of the American people.” Say that you’re being vilified and attacked by biased reporters using “alternative facts”.

When interviewed by a reporter, if you don’t know the answer to a question, make something up. The more outlandish the better. In 2020, Trump suggested the possibility of injecting disinfectant to kill the corona virus. That bonkers proclamation led to him owning the news cycle for days! And don’t let being fact-checked bother you, your voters don’t care about those things. Plus, your people have short attention spans. Your followers may be shocked by something you said today, but it’ll be forgotten tomorrow, because only media pundits and people following politics are keeping score. Most reporters attacking you are based in Blue-States, which, as we mentioned earlier, you have no chance of ever winning, so who cares what they have to say? You can relax in the fact that while they’re rattling their sabers at you, there are more people who don’t care about politics than do. At the end of the day, what will linger in people’s minds is you, and that’s what’s going to get you elected.

“News” sites you should be courting include Breitbart, FOX News, RedState, The Blaze, OAN, and any site that publishes the mysterious messages from QAnon. If you’re managing the media correctly, all of your opponents will seethe at how much free press you’re getting!

Surround Yourself with Cronies

As we wrap up the strategic process required to win the Presidency, we can’t forget to mention the importance of having an arsenal of cronies in the wings. Trump surrounded himself with the best. Look at the number of people who bravely took a bullet for the man when the chips were down; Steve Bannon (convicted in 2022 for contempt of Congress), Roger Stone (convicted in 2019 of lying under oath to lawmakers investigating Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election), Peter Navarro (charged with contempt of Congress after refusing to provide testimony to the house panel investigating the January 6 insurrection), Michael Flynn (pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his interactions with Russia's ambassador to the United States), Paul Manafort (found guilty in 2018 of fraud and pleaded guilty to money laundering and lobbying violations related to his work as a political consultant for pro-Russian Ukrainian politicians), and who can forget Rudy Giuliani. Rudy’s a textbook example of a lapdog you want in your corner. Even after being arrested for his efforts to overturn Trump’s election loss in Georgia, he STILL maintains Trump won. And if any of your cronies resist doing unethical or illegal actions on your behalf, get rid of them. A loyal crony knows they can expect a pardon when the law comes knocking!

Be Loud

Teddy Roosevelt may have said, “Speak softly and carry a big stick”, but that doesn’t work in a world where everyone’s competing for attention. When you’re stumping in the swing states, elevate your voice as you proselytize about how screwed up the nation is today. If you’re debating fellow office seekers on stage, interrupt, belittle and talk over them. And don’t be afraid to give answers that don’t directly answer the question. Well-mannered audience participants may think you’re rude, but this is your opportunity to build voter awareness, and that’s not going to happen by being polite. The great news is that if you find yourself way ahead in the polls, then you can skip debates altogether while your competitors squeak it out among themselves for second place. If you do find yourself having to take the debate stage, issue vague platitudes. Try to stay away from specifics, as people have short attention spans. If it requires more than one sentence to describe a pillar of your platform, you’ve already lost the debate. And there’s no wrong answer in a debate. If you don’t like a question, tell the moderator the question you would prefer to answer and then proceed with your answer. If they try to reel you back in, act like a petulant baby. If you get a fact wrong during an answer, the media will fact check you later, but by then it’s too late, everyone’s moved on, and no one cares. In the end, it's all about facetime in front of the cameras.

Now that I’ve shared with you a few of Trump’s secrets to winning elections, what’s stopping you putting on a suit, looking in the mirror, and telling yourself that you, too, can be the next President of the United States of America!