State of the Delusion: Trump Declares Victory Over Reality

In a single speech, the former president ends rare-earth crises, bans mail-in voting, and demands his cabinet sit up straighter.

Donald Trump swanned in to a formal entrance like he’d just won Best Actor for “Stare at a Teleprompter, Say ‘Beautiful’” and thanked the press for being nice during his world tour of photo-ops. He reminisced about last year’s “big, beautiful victory” (his favorite genre is nostalgia) and declared that last night’s elections were held in very Democratic places, which is convenient math for a bad scoreboard.

He announced he’d share “a few remarks,” then “ask the press to leave” so he could explain to Republican senators why the shutdown was definitely “Democrat-created” and “the longest in American history.” Once the journalists were out of earshot, he planned to strategize on how to blame Democrats for everything from the shutdown to the weather, and, of course, how to nuke the filibuster before lunch.

In Trump’s words:

“It’s time for Republicans to do what they have to do, and that’s terminate the filibuster. It’s the only way you can do it… and if you don’t terminate the filibuster, you’ll be in bad shape.”

The logic, such as it was, went like this: if Democrats ever gain power, they’ll “pack the court,” adding “five, maybe seven, maybe nine” new justices (“math is a vibe”), and make D.C. and Puerto Rico states, which in Trump’s telling would immediately usher in “four new senators” and the end of civilization.

“They’re going to pack the court… They’re going to make D.C. a state, and they’re going to make Puerto Rico a state. So now they pick up two states. They pick up four senators. You think you have problems?”

To Trump, this wasn’t a constitutional discussion, it was the prequel to The Purge: Senate Edition. He cast Democrats as “radical kamikazes” willing to “take down the country if they have to,” while portraying himself as the lone samurai of procedural purity, heroically destroying the rules before the other guys could.

On the economy, we are apparently living in The Hottest Economy Ever™, where record highs sprout every Friday, and a “construction boom” is about to molt into an “economic boom,” which will then evolve into a MegaBoom XL once Toyota’s mythical $10 billion checks finish clearing. Trump’s sourcing: “Mr. Toyota” (first name Money, last name Bags).

To prove his point, he recounted an anecdote from Japan:

“When I was in Japan, Toyota — Mr. Toyota — I said, ‘What’s your name?’ He said, ‘Toyota.’ I said, ‘Oh, you’re rich.’ He said, ‘How much of the company do you own?’ ‘Ninety-two point one percent.’ I said, ‘I’m glad you said the one.’”

Trump then proudly relayed that “Mr. Toyota” pledged to invest “$10 billion in the U.S.”, the kind of story that exists somewhere between a trade deal and a figment of imagination. He cited this as proof that the global economy is personally enchanted by his presence, adding that “we have auto plants coming in incredibly… we have AI and all of them.”

It’s economic wizardry, Trump-style: mix a few unverifiable anecdotes, sprinkle in a number ending in .1%, and declare the second coming of GDP. The markets tremble, the base applauds, and somewhere, a confused economist quietly screams into a spreadsheet.

On immigration, Trump painted a dystopian mural in broad, fear-saturated strokes. America, he warned, was being “extorted to give $1.5 trillion to people that came into the country illegally, many from prisons, many drug dealers, [and] a lot of people [who] came in from mental institutions.” These unnamed hordes, he declared, were “not going to be productive people. These are going to be anti-productive people.”

It’s classic Trump economics, where empathy is optional, math is metaphor, and every migrant is a stock ticker plunging in real time. He insisted no country could “sustain that”, framing compassion as fiscal suicide, before pivoting to the soft-focus part of his monologue:

“We can all have big hearts. I have a bigger heart than anybody. But we can’t let that happen.”

Translation: My empathy is huge, so huge, in fact, it can’t possibly be used. His vision of immigration reform is less Ellis Island and more Ellis Iron Curtain, a humanitarian crisis recast as a line item on a balance sheet, with all the warmth of a tax audit.

Then came elections: he wants universal voter ID and to ban mail-in voting, because, as everyone knows, you need to show ID to buy Doritos and fill up your Honda. He invoked the Carter Commission like a talisman, insisting mail ballots are corruption on wheels, while recounting the heroic saga of being asked for ID in Palm Beach and loving every second of it. (Subtext: “Sir, this is a Wendy’s.”)

Personnel? He’s at war with the Senate “blue slip” tradition, which he says lets Democrats block his perfect, flawless, summa-cum-ever nominees. He lionized Jay Clayton (Harvard of Harvard of Harvard) and said he once fired a would-be appointee because two Democratic senators wrote too nice a letter. (HR Best Practices: “If praised by the opposition, pack your things.”)

Perhaps there is a play here to get rid of Pam Bondi, Kash Patel and Pete Hegseth…

Foreign policy interlude: Trump announced he’d single-handedly solved a rare-earth crisis in the time it takes most presidents to find the briefing folder. “Don’t forget, two months ago it looked like the whole world was in trouble over rare earth,” he said. “That’s no longer even a subject people talk about. It was all worked out very quickly. Without tariffs I couldn’t have done it. I put a 100% tariff on China… within 20 minutes.”

Which, apparently, is how geology works now.

He pivoted to a love letter to authoritarian posture. “President Xi… he’s a tough man. Smart man, actually. Very smart.” Trump described Xi’s aides standing ramrod straight during their meeting:

“He’s got about six people on each side, and every one of those people was standing like this. They were at attention… I said, ‘Are you going to answer me?’ Got no response. President Xi didn’t let them have any.’”

Inspired, Trump decided he wanted the same level of spine-snapping discipline from his own team:

“I said, ‘I want my cabinet to behave like that. I’m demanding that my, I want them sitting up like that. I never saw posture like that.’”

Thus the Trump Doctrine, in one line: tariff first, posture later. It’s Militarized Pilates for senior officials, trade wars for your core and authoritarian aesthetics for the soul.

Grand finale: scrap the filibuster today, pass a Santa-sack of goodies (“no tax on tips, Social Security, or overtime,” plus everything else on the wish list), “open the country,” and declare legislative hegemony for the next two-to-three years. He thanked the press (again), announced he’s jetting to Miami for a big speech to a big crowd at a big venue with big bigness, and exited stage right in a cloud of superlatives.