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Donald Trump is Barack Obama’s inverse in a lot of ways that have been widely reported.
In my view, one of the most obvious and underreported ways is in their use of — and hopes for — the internet. And that comes to mind when I see Trump’s outspoken support for a vote-suppressing troll named Douglass Mackey.
Obama’s campaign and presidency represented what the internet could achieve at its best, whereas Trump’s have embodied it at its worst.
Both campaigns relied on digital targeting, for example. But Obama’s campaigns relied on targeting to get more people to the polls, while Trump — in his 2016 campaign, in particular — reportedly used digital targeting to dissuade many people from voting. (Trump took a victory lap on this point after he prevailed over Hillary Clinton, thanking the Black people who decided not to vote.)
And while Obama had creatives like digital strategist Ashleigh Axios devising ways to use the internet to bring people together and address inequality, Trump relied on folks like Brad Parscale — people who tried to come up with ways to agitate, castigate and manipulate potential voters online.
Obama invited fun and quirky social media influencers to help carry his message to the masses; Trump invited rabid right-wing internet trolls.
Obama invited fun and quirky social media influencers to help carry his message to the masses; Trump invited rabid right-wing internet trolls.
Obama used the internet to engage. Trump uses it to enrage.
It’s in this context that I view Trump’s praise for Mackey, a man convicted and sentenced to prison for his efforts to suppress Black votes in 2016. A new CNN report highlights the support Mackey publicly receives from Trump and his inner circle. (An attorney for Mackey told CNN that his client now regrets the tone and substance of his posts and said Mackey’s past tweets don’t reflect his current views.)
I’ve written about Mackey becoming a cause célèbre among right-wingers, who push claims that he was sent to jail for harmless memes and jokes, rather than voter suppression. I’ll note here that there’s a history of white racists in the U.S. using what they define as humor to legitimize attacks on Black people’s civil rights — so the “it’s just jokes” claim falls short on moral and factual grounds.
Make no mistake: Mackey is a man whose criminal actions stood to make the U.S. less free, which Clinton aptly noted earlier this year.
A world in which Mackey’s crime is forgiven or celebrated at the highest level of government (i.e., a potential Trump presidency) is a world where people are less free from manipulation — less free to make decisions of their own volition, without devious forces trying to suppress their rights.
With their ongoing attacks on disinformation experts and social media content moderation, Republicans have signaled their desire for malicious actors online to have free rein. I’m of the belief that there’s a cold war afoot between conservatives and liberals. And Mackey has become a right-wing martyr in that war.
On one end, you have folks like Obama who think an open, honest and humane internet is best whenever possible. And on the other, you have Trump and other conservatives, vying for a much more dystopian vision.