Why Citizens United no longer matters

I’ll start this conversation with a hot take: Citizens United is irrelevant. It no longer matters.

I can hear you right now: “Citizens United no longer matters? Are you crazy? How could a court decision that allows deep-pocketed corporate donors to funnel huge amounts of money into the federal election system NOT matter?”

Because money doesn’t determine elections anymore.

Oh, sure, it’s still a factor. And a lot of politicians, no matter what they may tell you, are in it to have their palms greased and line their pockets. But it’s no longer the determining factor. Consider as evidence: the Koch financial juggernaut, which bankrolled Republican politics during the Bush era, didn’t back Donald Trump. The Kochs didn’t like him. They didn’t think he furthered their interests, or corporate interests in general.

They were right. Trump didn’t rely on dark money, green money, or any other kind of money to get elected (not even his own, since he reneged on a vow to bankroll his own campaign). He relied on two other things: rage and lies.

The influence of Citizens United was predicated on two assumptions: First, that facts mattered and needed to be “spun” through messaging, and second, that money was necessary to get that messaging out.

A new operating system

But Trumpism obliterated both of those assumptions. Instead of spinning the facts, Trump simply told lies, and instead of using money to get his messaging out, he relied on free social media and on messaging from a media culture driven by sensationalism and the ratings he provided.

Under the Trump system, Citizens United is irrelevant. Corporate money isn’t important; the money generated by cable news ratings is, because that’s what keeps the likes of Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity front and center on Fox with their outrage and outrageousness — which then gets repeated on CNN and MSNBC under the “Can you believe what they just said?” principle.

Plus, the two-party system gives Trump and his imitators a built-in audience on the Republican side. Republicans have no other choice, they’ll eventually fall in line under a sort of modified Stockholm syndrome: They learn to love their abductors, because they’re seen as protectors from the evil world out there run by the only alternative, the “evil” Democrats.

Fear of “the other” becomes so deeply ingrained that it overwhelms rational thought or even self-preservation. It’s more important to “own the libs” than protect yourself from a deadly virus, for example. Trump began pounding this fear into his followers by castigating immigrants during the 2015 primaries, then spread it by refusing to forcefully condemn racists, and then by casting journalists and anyone else who opposed him as “traitors.”

Who needs money when you’ve already got blind loyalty and free coverage? That’s a hell of a lot more dependable than anything Citizens United could ever buy.

Fear trumps money

Citizens United is irrelevant in the Trump era for one simple reason: Buying people’s support doesn’t work as well as holding them hostage, and Republicans are basically Trump’s hostages because they think he’s protecting them from something they think is even worse. The “enemy.” It doesn’t matter whether he can solve their problems or not, as long as he can “win.”

Politicians learned the power of fear a long time ago, and they’ve used it repeatedly over the years. Lyndon Johnson (a Democrat) ran ads that scared voters into thinking Barry Goldwater was a loose cannon who would get the U.S. into a nuclear war with the Soviets. And George W. Bush used terrorism as a bogeyman to win re-election after 9/11.

But no one has ever taken the fear factor to the extreme used by Trump. He hasn’t just focused his followers’ fears on a single manufactured threat, such as terrorism and immigration. Instead, he’s made them afraid of anything and anyone who dares to oppose him, because “he alone can fix it.” He’s their savior and everyone else is the devil: Democrats, immigrants, socialists, Black people, RINOs, the mainstream media... you name it.

Everyone eventually runs afoul of him and becomes the enemy, because Trump thinks he’s in a bad remake of Highlander and is convinced “there can be only one.” Nikki Haley? Not loyal enough. Poor obsequious Mike Pence? Not obsequious enough. He’s no longer little Donnie’s friend.

The sad irony is that the clearer it is that Trump can never be satisfied, the harder they try to do it. It’s an endless cycle of abuse and victimhood, and Trump perpetuates it by claiming he himself is the victim. And because he claims to share in their victimhood, they embrace him, oblivious to the fact that he’s not like them: a billionaire, not a struggling blue-collar worker; not a victim at all, but an abuser.

Who needs Citizens United when you’ve got fear? Fear that’s so pervasive there’s no other option but to embrace it and to embrace its purveyor as your protector?

A lot of us thought for a very long time that money was the essence of politics.

Trump taught us otherwise.

The most effective politics runs on fear and lies.

Stephen H. Provost is the author of three books on the Trump era, the “Trumpism on Trial” series focusing on the Trump’s methods, his relationship with the media, and evangelicals’ embrace of him. All three books are available on Amazon.