Texas Tech University

Trump never transitioned away from campaign rhetoric

The Hill

May 4, 2019

President Trump held a large, raucous campaign rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan in late March.

It was heralded by the Daily Beast as "a taste of President Trump's 2020 Make America Great Again Again pitch," a preview of the rhetoric we can expect from the president in the upcoming campaign. This is a bit misleading, however, because it implies that, at some point, Trump stopped campaigning. He did not.

And that got me thinking: If it is not obvious that the president only utilizes campaign-style rhetoric, then maybe his other rhetorical choices are not so obvious either. So, here is an introductory guide to Trump's rhetoric, which is governed by three simple principles.

Story written by: Brian L. Ott, a professor of communication studies and director of the TTU Press at Texas Tech University, is co-author, with Greg Dickinson, of "The Twitter Presidency: Donald J. Trump and the Politics of White Rage."

Read the whole story here.