In the final days of the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, Donald Trump boasted that, unlike Hillary Clinton, he did not need celebrities to fill large stadiums with his supporters. “I didn’t have to bring J.Lo or Jay-Z,” he said. “I am here all by myself. Just me. No guitar, no piano, no nothing.” For once, the candidate was neither lying nor exaggerating. During the campaign, Trump consistently turned out larger and more enthusiastic crowds than Clinton. Indeed, in sheer zeal and passion, the crowds were unlike anything seen in American politics over the previous half-century, except for Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama.
Fast-forward four years and then-candidate Trump has become the president who has presided with jaw-dropping incompetence over the worst public health disaster in over a century, an economic collapse, and large-scale urban turmoil. Yet polls still show him with an approval rating hovering around 40 percent, and a hard core of his base still displays as much fervor for him as at any time since his famous descent of the Trump Tower escalator in 2015.
