Philippa Kaur

Joe Biden has announced he will no longer contest the 2024 US presidential election. He has thrown his support instead behind his vice president, Kamala Harris.

In most countries, including Australia, such a decision would trigger a meeting of party number-crunchers behind closed doors, where the party would select a new candidate and announce the decision to the rest of the country.

Not in America.

How nominees are selected

American political parties arguably have the most transparent system to select candidates running for office in the world. This very transparency, which many cherish as an additional democratic feature of the American political system, makes the next steps a bit more complicated today than some may be acknowledging.

In brief, any party member who wants to run for president of the United States must run for “primary” elections. Each party holds their own primaries — or caucuses — and whoever wins those becomes the party’s candidate at the general election.

The process, however, is indirect: when voters vote for a candidate during a primary election, their vote actually triggers the selection of a party delegate who is pledged to vote for that candidate during the party convention. The party’s nominee is then formally selected at the convention.

The Democratic party has around 4,700 delegates. Of these, around 3,800 delegates were pledged to nominate Biden for president and are now essentially free agents. Biden’s endorsement of Harris might convince some of them to support her bid, but they are under no obligation to do so.

This situation is unprecedented in modern US elections. The current presidential nominating system based on widespread primary elections took shape in the 1970s. Since then, it has worked virtually flawlessly, with candidates from both parties collecting pledged delegates during the primary season and receiving the nomination during each party’s convention.

The last time that any of the two major American parties held an “open convention” – that is, a convention where there is no individual with enough pledged delegates to be considered the presumptive party nominee and instead the delegates choose the candidate with a free vote – was the Democratic National Convention of 1968. Nothing like this has happened since.

So what happens now?

Harris is definitely running to secure the party’s nomination. Several prominent Democrats have also endorsed her candidacy. But she is not the official Democratic candidate yet, and has some way to go in order to secure the nomination.

According to the party rules, at this stage any member of the Democratic party can gather signatures from at least 300 delegates from a minimum of six states to run for the top spot on the Democratic ticket. This means, theoretically, that there could be up to 15 people seeking the Democratic nomination, including Harris, although it is highly unlikely that such a large number of contenders will enter the field now.

So far, no other potential candidate has expressed a clear intention to run. Should there be more than one candidate, the party rules state that each candidate has the right to give a 20-minute speech in front of the convention, before the delegates vote on the nominee. If a small number of contenders emerged, such a process could be managed effectively. If a large number of contenders were to emerge, however, then the process could quickly become messy, resulting in multiple ballots before a candidate is selected.

From August 19-22, Democrats will gather in Chicago for their national convention. Interestingly, Chicago was also the city where the Democrats gathered during the last properly contentious convention in 1968.

That year, President Lyndon Johnson announced on March 31 that he was not going to run for re-election. A few days later, on April 4, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis. Then on June 6, right after winning the California primary election during his presidential bid, Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated.

When the Democratic delegates gathered in Chicago, they nominated the vice president, Hubert Humphrey, who had not run in any of the primary elections and caucuses that took place that season. Anti-Vietnam war protests also triggered a number of riots and protests around Chicago, so the process was extremely volatile.

We don’t know yet if 2024 is going to be an open convention or not. But we know that many have been arguing that, if Biden stepped down, there should not be a “coronation” of Harris, but rather a democratic process that selects the next candidate.

Harris has also stated that she wants to “earn and win” the nomination. Donations also appear to have been flowing in record numbers towards the Democratic cause since Biden’s announcement.

There is now a very delicate balancing act unfolding between keeping the democratic nature of the nominating process intact and ensuring that the Democratic party is quickly united if it has any chance of beating Donald Trump in November. More

The United States election will be held on November 5. On Sunday US time, President Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential election contest and endorsed his vice president, Kamala Harris.

It’s not certain, but very likely Harris will now be the Democratic candidate to face former Republican president Donald Trump in November. During the Democratic presidential primaries held early this year, Biden won about 95% of all delegates to the August 19–22 Democratic convention. These delegates are likely to support Harris given Biden’s endorsement.

Since the debate with Trump on June 27 that was widely thought to have been a disaster for Biden, he has faced pressure to withdraw. In an Ipsos poll for US ABC News that was released before Biden’s withdrawal on Sunday, Democratic voters wanted Biden to withdraw by 60–39.

Following the assassination attempt against Trump on July 13 and the Republican convention from July 15–18, Trump’s lead over Biden in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate of national polls had increased to 3.2 points from 1.9 points on July 13, the largest margin since the aggregate began in March. Vote shares were 43.5% Trump, 40.2% Biden and 8.7% for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

I’ve written previously that the presidency is not decided by the national popular vote. Instead each state has a certain amount of Electoral Votes (EVs), mostly based on population, with each state awarding their EVs winner takes all. It takes 270 EVs to win. The EV system is likely to skew to Trump, so Biden was further behind than in the national polls.

Biden will continue as president until his term ends in January 2025. His net approval in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate is -17.7, with 56.2% disapproving and 38.5% approving. His net approval is worse than other previous presidents at this point in their term, except George Bush Sr and Jimmy Carter.

Trump’s net favourability in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate is -12.0, with 53.7% unfavourable and 41.7% favourable. His ratings are relatively unchanged since April. Unfortunately, FiveThirtyEight has no favourability ratings for Harris.

Will Harris win?

It’s too soon to analyse Harris vs Trump polls. Harris had not been a presidential candidate before today and name recognition of Biden explains his often better numbers than Harris. A recent national YouGov poll for CBS News gave Trump a five-point lead over Biden and a three-point lead over Harris.

There are two things that should advantage Harris. One is that economic data has improved, with inflation dropping and real earnings up. The other is that, while Biden would have been almost 82 by the election, Harris will only be 60 by then. Trump is 78, so the age split that was unfavourable to Biden will be favourable to Harris.

It’s too early to tell what a contest between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris might look like in the polls.
Allison Dinner/EPA

Nevertheless, nominating a candidate who has not been battle-tested in the primaries is very risky. When Harris ran for president in 2020, she withdrew from the contest in December 2019, before any primaries.

However, with Biden’s age of great concern to voters, and with him already behind Trump, switching to a new candidate could prove a sensible move for the Democrats. Changes in prime minister have worked for Australian parties in the past, with Malcolm Turnbull winning the 2016 federal election after replacing Tony Abbott, and Scott Morrison winning in 2019 after replacing Turnbull.

While Biden has been losing, US Senate polls in the presidential swing states of Pennsylvania, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan and Arizona suggest the Democratic candidates are winning, and doing much better than Biden. So perhaps Democrats just have a Biden problem.

US earnings up

In June, headline inflation dropped 0.1% after being unchanged in May and 12-month inflation dropped to 3.0%, the lowest it has been since June 2023. Core inflation was up 0.1% in June after increasing 0.2% in May and has increased 3.3% in the last 12 months, the smallest increase since April 2021.

The low inflation in May and June has boosted real (inflation-adjusted) earnings in those months, with real hourly earnings up 0.9% for May and June and real weekly earnings up 0.7%. In the 12 months to June, real hourly earnings are up 0.8% and real weekly earnings up 0.6%.

In June, a net 206,000 jobs were added, but the unemployment rate increased 0.1% to 4.1%. This is the highest unemployment rate since November 2021. More

There’s a reason Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign is working hard to evoke nostalgia: People who are nostalgic – meaning, people who long for America’s “good old days” – were more likely to vote for Republican candidates in the 2022 midterm elections, according to research I conducted along with collaborators Kirby Goidel and Paul Kellstedt.

The first day of the 2024 Republican National Convention kicked off with a nostalgic message from Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin imploring voters to back Trump and “make America the land of opportunity again.”

And in general, the 2024 RNC themes largely wax nostalgic with “Make America Wealthy Once Again” on Monday, “Make America Safe Once Again” on Tuesday, “Make America Strong Once Again” on Wednesday, and “Make America Great Once Again” on Thursday.

The American public leans nostalgic. Through the 2022 Cooperative Election Study survey, which is a collective effort across many researchers and research groups, we surveyed 1,000 U.S. adults and found that approximately 54% of the respondents to our questions agree that “the world used to be a better place.” Other questions we asked included “How often do you long for the good old days in this country?” and “Do you think the American culture and way of life has mostly changed for the worse or better since the 1950s?”

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin addresses the Republican National Convention on July 15, 2024.

From their answers, we constructed a scale of how much nostalgia a person feels for America’s past, and we used this scale to examine the influence of nostalgia on people’s vote choice in the 2022 midterm elections.

Our results show that the influence of nostalgia is most pronounced among independent voters.

In 2022, partisans, meaning people who aren’t independents, were loyal supporters of their respective parties, regardless of how much nostalgia they have. But independents, or people without party attachments, who feel relatively little nostalgia have a 57% probability of voting Democratic and 40% probability of voting Republican. Meanwhile, independents with relatively high levels of nostalgia have a 25% probability of voting Democratic and 74% probability of voting Republican.

Looking ahead to the 2024 general election, our findings indicate that nostalgic appeals could attract those more independent-minded swing voters to the Republican Party.

Trump’s nostalgic appeal

As a record number of Americans disapprove of incumbent President Joe Biden, a New York Times/Siena College poll finds that nostalgia for the late 2010s is setting in.

Trump’s role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and his handling of the pandemic seem like blips compared to the three years of sustained economic growth during his presidency from 2016 to 2019. Just 9% of voters say the insurrection or COVID-19 is the one thing they remember most from the Trump presidency – 24% recall the economy. It’s no surprise Trump’s presidential campaign is steeped in nostalgia, again.

Trump is using the same slogan that he used officially in his 2016 campaign and unofficially in his 2020 reelection bid – “make America great again.” In 2016 and 2020, the slogan referred to a vague and distant American past when things were better, simpler.

Now, the former president’s appeal has an element of specificity to it. “Make America great again” – captured in the acronym “MAGA” – is a pledge to return things both to “the good old days” and to the way they were during Trump’s presidency. Trump’s campaign is explicit about this connection. For example, the campaign website cites Trump’s first-term accomplishments when it lists “rebuild the greatest economy in history,” “stop crime and restore safety,” and “renew American strength and leadership” as some of Trump’s top priorities for another term.

Ronald Reagan makes his final pitch to voters in the 1980 presidential election.

Are you better off than you were four years ago?

Presidential candidates often use nostalgia in their campaigns. “Make America great again” was not novel in 2016: It was co-opted from Ronald Reagan’s “let’s make America great again” pitch in 1980.

Reagan was masterful in his use of nostalgic appeals. In 1980, he was running against an extremely unpopular incumbent president in Jimmy Carter. After four years of the Carter presidency, the American economy was significantly worse off than in 1976. The inflation rate was 13.5%, and the economy was in a recession.

While debating Carter, Reagan famously asked the audience, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” The answer to Reagan’s question was clearly, “No.”

Comparing current conditions to the recent past is a crucial component of democratic accountability. The act of voting is inherently retrospective, a judgment of past performance. Voters need to be able to hold incumbent presidents accountable.

However, Trump’s nostalgia is more than simple retrospection. Trump’s appeal isn’t just about a better economic past or a more stable society. It serves as an evocation of a time in America when women and minorities had less power.

Nostalgia as a dog whistle

In a recently published paper in the journal Research & Politics, political scientists Kirby Goidel, Bradley Madsen and I find that feelings of nostalgia are strongly related to sexism and racism.

Analyses show that those people with more nostalgia are 23% more likely than those with less nostalgia to agree with the following racist statement: “Irish, Italian, Jewish and many other minorities overcame prejudice and worked their way up. Blacks should do the same without any special favors.”

Similarly, nostalgic respondents are significantly more likely to believe that women “are too easily offended” and that they “seek to gain power by getting control over men.”

The connection of nostalgia to racial resentment and hostile sexism is why Trump’s nostalgic appeal is so potent and polarizing: Nostalgia is not merely about the past four years or even the Reagan-era 1980s; it harks back to an era before the Civil Rights Movement, and before the feminist movement gained momentum. More

As the United States presidential election race gathers pace, current president Joe Biden’s advanced age continues to draw significant scrutiny.

But either candidate would reach the record for the oldest sitting US president over the course of their four-year term. While Biden is currently 81 years old, former US president Donald Trump, at 78, is only three years younger.

A February poll found 59% of Americans believe both candidates are too old for another presidential term. A further 27% thought President Biden was too old, but not former President Trump.

Criticism of Biden increased following the first US presidential debate in late June. Concerns were raised about his performance, including his soft, muffled speech, and his tendency to make illogical points or trail off.

More recently, during a press conference at the NATO summit, Biden made several verbal errors, including referring to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as President Putin and to US Vice President Kamala Harris as Vice President Trump.

Many people, including medical experts, have speculated that President Biden is showing classic features of neurodegeneration, including cognitive decline. But to what degree is cognitive decline a normal part of ageing? And what can we really tell about Biden’s cognitive state from public appearances alone?

Cognitive changes are a part of ageing

While it’s true that cognitive function changes with normal ageing, not all aspects of cognition are affected to the same extent, and not all changes are negative.

Some domains of cognitive function show age-related decline, particularly those reliant on “fluid” abilities. Fluid abilities require individuals to pay attention to their environment and quickly process information to solve problems. These skills show steady decline from around age 20.

This can lead to changes in areas including:

memory
executive function (for example, the ability to plan, multitask and exhibit self-control)
language
attention
perceptual-motor control (the ability to coordinate between what we perceive with our senses and resulting actions).

Nevertheless, while older adults may take longer processing new information or switching between tasks, they often still do so correctly. Similarly, while older adults may find recalling past information (for example, struggling to remember someone’s name when you meet them unexpectedly) or memorising new information (such as the weekly grocery list) challenging, these changes don’t usually significantly impact day-to-day function.

There are also memory aids and strategies that can compensate for these changes and reduce their effects. These might include keeping a to-do list, using tricks to remember new information, or setting reminders. As such, age-related cognitive changes alone don’t necessarily impact a person’s ability to perform a particular job.

Some areas of cognitive function slow down as we age – but not all.
wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock

Certain aspects of cognitive function actually improve with age, in particular, “crystallised” abilities. These rely on the cumulative skills and knowledge gained throughout a person’s life, such as general knowledge or vocabulary. These improve up to one’s 60s and then plateau to around age 80.

Similarly, older adults tend to manage conflict better, using strategies that allow for compromise, emphasising the value of multiple perspectives and recognising knowledge limits.

Progression to dementia

A subset of older adults (around 12–18%) develop mild cognitive impairment, where cognitive decline becomes pronounced enough to be noticed by family and friends, and may begin to have some impact on daily function.

People with mild cognitive impairment might forget things more often, lose their train of thought, struggle with decision making or experience changes in their judgement.

While some people with mild cognitive impairment remain stable or even improve, 10–15% go on to develop dementia each year, with cognitive impairment progressively becoming severe enough to significantly impact on daily function and lead to changes in behaviour and personality.

Cognitive function can vary

A range of factors, including genetic, environmental and lifestyle factors, influence variations in cognitive function.

While some of these factors (such as genetics) cannot be modified, others can be. For example, in a study that followed people for eight years, physical inactivity, smoking and alcohol consumption were associated with increased cognitive decline. Increased cognitive decline relative to normal age-related changes can make it difficult for people to carry out everyday tasks, such as remembering to pay bills, attend appointments or take medications.

On the flip side, addressing these factors could offer some protection against cognitive decline.

Age-related cognitive decline can be different for different people.
fizkes/Shutterstock

There are also short-term influences to consider. After the debate, Biden’s team argued he was unwell and had jet lag.

Evidence shows multiple factors can negatively affect the relationship between age and cognitive function. These include jet lag, viral infection, stress or even poor sleep, which may all be relevant in the current case.

So sometimes, episodes that might look like cognitive decline can actually be temporary, due to these external factors.

What about Biden?

While President Biden has shown some difficulties with speech and memory in recent appearances, this doesn’t necessarily mean he’s experiencing cognitive decline.

Much of the speculation regarding Biden’s cognitive state has been based on people watching video footage of the president. But it’s crucial to stress that a person’s cognitive status cannot be determined without formal assessment. Some medical experts have urged President Biden to undergo such neurological testing and make the results public.

It’s also worth remembering that former President Trump is not without a history of his own verbal gaffes.

Ultimately, until actual medical evidence to the contrary becomes available, we must beware of becoming “armchair physicians” and stay focused on policy issues. More

The image of the would-be assassin at Donald Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13 is now part of history. A young man in beige lying dead on the flat roof. Minutes earlier, this self-appointed executioner had been pointing his rifle at Trump, aiming to shoot the former president in front of his followers.

What drove this young man to try to kill? Thomas Matthew Crooks was 20 years old, two years out of school and still living with his parents in a town an hour away from the shooting. In his 2022 school yearbook photos, Crooks bears little resemblance to the assassins of film and television who are typically hardened, self-reliant executioners or highly professional hitmen or women.

As far his marksmanship goes, former classmates said Crooks had been rejected from the school rifle team because he was a terrible shot. But coldblooded killers come in all shapes and sizes, as I discovered when I interviewed a number of killers from the streets of Belfast for my 2005 book, Protestant Boy.

These killers, caught up in the Troubles in Northern Ireland, belonged to various paramilitary organisations. They had organisational and social support, and ideologies that allowed them to justify their acts – even the murders of completely innocent civilians.

Belonging to a paramilitary organisation allowed them to build a shared narrative: “The state do even worse things than us,” they would say indignantly, “with the SAS and their shoot-to-kill policy.”

Lone wolf

In contrast, so-called lone-wolf assassins have no group like this to fall back on, to share and dilute responsibility for their actions. They’re on their own, without the protection of a socially-shared narrative.

Psychological research reinforces this notion of difference. American researcher Clark McCauley and colleagues have suggested that mental disorder is particularly prevalent in lone-wolf terrorists. Theodore Kaczynski, the “Unabomber”, was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.

Jared Loughner, who shot and severely injured US congresswoman Gabby Giffords and killed six others in 2011, was schizophrenic. Anders Breivik, the Norwegian neo-Nazi who killed 77 people the same year, was originally also thought to suffer from schizophrenia, but his diagnosis was subsequently changed to narcissistic personality disorder.

In 2015, psychologists Emily Corner and Paul Gill conducted an analysis of 119 lone-actor terrorists and a matched sample of group-based terrorists, and found the probability of a lone-actor terrorist having a mental illness was 13.5 times higher than a group-based terrorist.

But while some form of mental disorder may be a risk factor for lone-wolf terrorism, there are additional factors which seem to be critical. These include holding a strong personal or political grievance, coupled with some form of desensitisation to violence through a gradual escalation of violent behaviour.

The story of Mark Chapman, John Lennon’s killer, suggests that status-seeking can also be important. This may be even more prevalent now in our social media-dominated world, coinciding with what some psychologists suggest is a dramatic rise in narcissism and narcissistic personality disorder.

A photo of Thomas Matthew Crooks aged about 18, taken from his 2022 school yearbook.
CBS news

When this narcissism is combined with lack of empathy, callousness and emotional flatness of the kind you tend to find in psychopathy, then you can have a particularly dangerous combination.

What drives an assassin?

How prevalent are these factors among assassins? A 1999 report by US psychologist Robert Fein and Bryan Vossekuil, then executive director of the National Threat Assessment Center with the US secret service, analysed all people who attacked, or approached to attack, a “prominent person of public status in the US since 1949”. There were 83 assassins analysed: most (86%) were male, the vast majority (77%) were Caucasian, and more than half (55%) had seen service in the military.

In their 2013 article, which looked at data from the Fein-Vossekuil report, McCauley and colleagues, , suggested that grievance is indeed a significant factor for assassins (67%). In 71% of cases, a prior history of weapon use was also identified, and in 59% a history of interest in violence. Some 44% of the assassins studied by Fein and Vossekuil were found to have had suicidal thoughts or had attempted suicide.

While different assassins and lone-wolf terrorists clearly act on a range of different motives, there appear to be common elements: some sort of mental disturbance; a festering grievance vented in echo chambers on the internet, or bottled up inside but rarely properly articulated. There is also, generally, an interest in violence combined with desensitisation to that violence, and a desire to raise their social status through any means.

Crooks only succeeded in injuring Trump, so if he set out to kill the former president, he failed in his objective. But we all know his name now, and that might well have been very important to him. More

As the sound of gunshots interrupted Donald Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, the former US president clutched his right ear before squatting to the ground.

Members of the Secret Service quickly surrounded Trump, who fiercely pumped his fist towards the crowd. It was during this moment an instantly iconic photo was taken as Trump stood, fist raised, in front of the US flag – blood running from his ear to his cheek.

Almost immediately, conspiracy theorists from all parts of the political spectrum began to speculate over the attempted assassination.

I’m a researcher who studies how conspiracy theories are formed online, with a particular focus on those that impact democratic proceedings. Following this incident, my investigation across several platforms reveals how various conspiracy theories have rapidly emerged – and what they might mean for democratic proceedings in the future.

A Reddit users implies the blood visible on Trump’s face was fake.
Reddit

Conspiracy theorists ask: who is responsible?

Just hours after the incident, the FBI released the shooter’s identity: 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. Crooks fired multiple shots from a nearby rooftop outside the rally venue, killing one attendee and critically injuring two others. He himself was also killed at the event. A motive has not yet been determined.

Despite the shooter’s identity being released, one major conspiracy adopted by both the political left and right is that the assassination attempt was staged and/or planned. But who is supposed to have staged it? This is up for debate depending on which online circles you frequent.

One Reddit user commenting on the use of supposedly ‘fake blood’.
Reddit

Left-wing conspiracy theories seem to point the finger at the Republican party. Their supposed “evidence” is that there was no blood on Trump’s face until he raised his hand to his cheek (although this is difficult to confirm based on videos posted online). Nonetheless, they claim Trump used a squib to release fake blood.

Other “evidence” is that the Secret Service allowed Trump to stand and pose as he was escorted offstage. According to these theories, if there was an active shooter Trump would have been taken away with much more urgency.

TikTok users took to the platform to speculate.
Tiktok

Right-leaning supporters of the “staged” theory point to either President Joe Biden, the US Department of Justice, or other powerful actors as being either explicitly or implicitly responsible.

Their “evidence” also involves the Secret Service. Many have said the shooter should have been clearly visible and interrupted by the Secret Service before the attack. Some conspiracy theorists go as far as to say the shooter knew which roof he could conduct the shooting from without being interrupted.

They either point to the Secret Service as being remiss in the security planning of the rally, or actively complicit in the shooting.

A political opportunity

In 2022, a study based in the United States found belief in conspiracy theories can be strongly associated with certain psychological traits and non-political worldviews.

Specifically, the researchers found conspiratorial thinking isn’t consistently associated with a particular political party, but with how extreme a person’s beliefs are. This is seen both for extreme-left and particularly for extreme right-wing political beliefs.

It’s also reflected in what is emerging online following the Trump assassination attempt, wherein social media users of various political leanings are helping spread the conspiracy that the incident was staged.

The reasons for conspiratorial beliefs can be psychological, social or political. They may range from seeking a sense of identity and community, to distrust in the government and other institutions.

For political figures and other influential actors, conspiracy theories are weaponised for personal gain.

With Senator J.D. Vance having been chosen as Trump’s running mate, we can expect to see more fuel added to the flames. Vance is one of the most prominent politicians claiming the Biden administration is responsible (whether directly or indirectly) for the assassination attempt.

This sentiment has been echoed by several others, including Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene and Congressman Mike Collins.

Meanwhile, X (formerly Twitter) chief Elon Musk has reposted multiple messages from an alt-right political activist asking how the shooter was able to crawl onto the closest roof to a presidential nominee, suggesting the Secret Service was intentionally remiss. One of these posts has garnered some 91 million views so far.

While X has served as a hotbed for conspiracy theories following the event, the comment sections of other platforms and news articles have also become places of debate. Anywhere users can deliberate and share their views, conspiratorial thinking can propagate.

Screenshot of comments promoting conspiracy theories. The comments were made on a New York Post article which broke the name of the shooter.

The politicians amplifying the conspiracy theories are contributing to increased tension in the lead-up to a highly contentious election. This includes Vance, who may well end up in the US presidential line of succession if Trump wins the election in November.

What are the consequences?

Beyond highlighting the deeply partisan nature of US politics, what might these conspiracy theories mean in the long run?

Previous findings indicate presenting explicit conspiracy theories to people results in lowered trust in elections. As voters from both sides of the political spectrum are exposed to conspiratorial thinking (and increasingly adversarial discussions) around the assassination attempt, it may become difficult for people to trust the democratic proceedings accompanying the 2024 election.

A poll conducted earlier this year found 25% of Americans believe it was possible the January 6 Capitol attack was organised by the FBI. This is despite an extensive investigation by the US Congress and hundreds of legal cases involving participants in the riot.

In 1963, Jack Ruby murdered Lee Harvey Oswald, after the latter was accused of assassinating Kennedy.
New York Post

Research also suggests distrust in the government and institutions can lead to people changing the way they interact with the political system. Some may be pushed to vote for governmental change or independent candidates in a bipartisan system, while others may withdraw from engaging with democracy altogether.

One might hope the recent escalation in political violence will lead to a more tempered approach to politics in the upcoming months. But if the current state of things is any guide, the outlook for democracy is concerning. More

After the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at his Pennsylvania campaign rally, there is much speculation about how this will affect the 2024 US election. However, no one is yet asking how these events may affect Trump himself.

Many appear to assume that because Trump walked away with seemingly minor injuries, he will continue with business as usual. For anyone who thought society now understood the potential mental health effects of trauma, this assumption is both disappointing and troubling.

Trump may not experience any psychological effects, but given that he could soon be re-elected, the potential effect of these events on his mental health — whether negligible, negative or positive — cannot be ignored.

These tragic events also offer an opportunity for both society and Trump to reignite the wider conversation about the effect and management of trauma and to spur new action.

Trump joins tens of thousands of Americans treated for non-fatal gunshot wounds each year. Such experiences can shatter people’s assumptions that they are living in a safe, understandable and controllable world, leaving them feeling unworthy, unsafe and unsure.

As a result, survivors of non-fatal gun violence face increased risks of depression, anxiety, substance use and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). PTSD can feel overwhelming. People may re-experience the event through flashbacks or nightmares. They may also have palpitations, sweating or breathlessness when reminded of the event.

PTSD also often sees people trying to avoid reminders of the event, losing interest in activities, and feeling numb, irritable and jumpy. They may be constantly watching out for threats, have difficulty concentrating, have angry outbursts and experience overwhelming emotions.

Indeed, many trauma survivors struggle with their emotions. The person may not understand or be aware of their emotions, find it hard to control them, and struggle to stay focused and avoid impulsive actions. Given Trump’s previously reported “uncontrollable” experiences of anger, his emotions and ability to manage them will come under scrutiny.

Conversely, some trauma survivors experience post-traumatic growth. They may develop greater empathy, stronger relationships, deeper spirituality and find new meaning in life. After being shot in 1981, the then president Ronald Reagan’s trauma seemed to deepen his sense of empathy and humility. He felt God had spared him for a reason, spurring him to reduce nuclear tensions with the Soviet Union.

Being shot led to some positive changes in Ronald Reagan.
Associated Press / Alamy Stock Photo

Reactions to trauma vary widely. The outcome is influenced by a person’s personality and biology. The meaning people make of their experience and the available social support also play a key role.

Being an extrovert, as Trump is argued to be, is linked to a better ability to adapt to stress and fewer PTSD symptoms. However, other personality traits, including low agreeableness, low conscientiousness and low emotional stability, also attributed to Trump, are associated with greater levels of PTSD. Finally, high levels of narcissism, as Trump is said to display, also encourage the development of PTSD and can cause people to react to even limited threats with aggression.

How someone makes sense of their trauma can be crucial for its consequences. Feeling shame or anger with others after experiencing violent crime is associated with a greater likelihood of developing PTSD.

If the person can make sense of why the event happened or can draw something positive from it, better outcomes can be expected. The meaning Reagan made of his shooting was that it was a sign of divine protection and destiny, which appears to have reinforced his commitment to his presidential duties.

Social support can be vital to recovery from trauma. Having high levels of social support before experiencing a trauma makes one less likely to develop PTSD. And high levels of social support after PTSD help with recovery.

Such support can come from family, friends or a community, who can help by providing safety and belonging, helping them make sense of events, helping with problem-solving and discouraging risky behaviour. Trump’s family and team will be essential in helping him process this weekend’s events.

On which note, the ability of trauma to powerfully ripple out from an event also needs to be recognised. Those at Trump’s rally, including his security detail, as well as his friends, family and the wider public who witnessed the event on TV, all need to be aware of potential signs of trauma in themselves and each other.

Opportunity for positive effects

Thankfully, there is now a wide range of psychological therapies to help people with PTSD. Many mental health charities also offer suggestions and support. Yet there remains much to be done, including a need for more mental health staff training in trauma-informed care and greater government support and funding for services.

Recent events offer Trump an opportunity to positively drive such change. He could help destigmatise the struggles that many survivors of trauma experience. This could include busting the myth that it is a sign of weakness to seek support and help. Conversely, were Trump to make any disparaging remarks about survivors of trauma, akin to those he is alleged to have made before about wounded veterans, this would be profoundly damaging.

Trump could also help dispel the lingering idea that PTSD is primarily linked to guns, combat and warfare. He could highlight how around half of rape survivors experience PTSD. Indeed, as psychologist Judith Herman points out, “the most common PTSDs are those not of men in war, but of women in civilian life”.

Trump could also help society better understand non-fatal gun violence and enhance the provision of effective care for both survivors and their families.

As the world watches, the effect of these events on Trump, both personally and politically, will unfold. Everyone is deserving of compassion. Effectively dealing with the psychological effects of trauma will be crucial, not just for Trump but for society as a whole. More

In America, we resolve our differences at the ballot box … not with bullets. The power to change America should always rest in the hands of the people, not in the hands of a would-be assassin.

So said the US president, Joe Biden, in an Oval Office address to the nation the day after the attempted assassination of his rival in November’s presidential election.

US president, Joe Biden, calls on America to ‘lower the temperature’ in US politics.

The shockwaves of Trump surviving an effort to kill him at a campaign event in Pennsylvania on July 13 are still being felt across the United States and around the world. The FBI stated it has picked up on increasing levels of violent political rhetoric being expressed in the aftermath of the assassination attempt.

And, contrary to Biden’s insistence that there is “no place in America for this kind of violence”, Katie Stallard, a non-resident global fellow at the Wilson Centre in Washington DC, believes that: “The attack on Donald Trump was shocking, but it wasn’t unprecedented by American standards, and it wasn’t entirely unforeseeable.”

The Trump assassination attempt follows a disturbing trend in America of extremists embarking on violent plots to silence their perceived opponents.

Researchers Professor Pete Simi of Chapman University, and Seamus Hughes, University of Nebraska, have examined threats against political candidates between 2013 and 2023. They found that “over the past 10 years, more than 500 individuals have been arrested for threatening public officials. And the trendline is shooting up.”

Over the past three years alone, America has witnessed a surge in violence linked to a darkening political landscape that has seen combative and toxic discourse infect its body politic.

The Capitol riots in January 2021 were preceded by a speech from the then president, Donald Trump, where he told an assembled crowd the November 2020 presidential election had been “stolen”. Following this address thousands of the president’s supporters marched on the Capitol building.

The ensuing mayhem resulted in a violent riot and the deaths of five people, including a police officer.

In October 2022, Paul Pelosi, the husband of the then House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, was attacked in his home and bludgeoned with a hammer by far-right conspiracy theorist David DePape. DePape’s plan was to find Pelosi herself, hold her hostage, and “break her kneecaps”. Donald Trump would later mock Mr Pelosi at a Republican campaign event.

Donald Trump mocks Paul Pelosi after the House speaker’s husband was assaulted.

In September 2023, Trump sparked fury with a social media post criticising former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Mark Milley. On “Truth Social” the former president, angered by revelations that Milley had taken a phone call with Chinese officials after the January 6 2021 riots, wrote: “This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!”

Guns and angry folks

Polling conducted by Professor Robert A. Pape from the University of Chicago, sheds new light on the worrying positions some Americans have towards the utility of political violence. This survey of over 2,000 people found that 10% of respondents viewed the use of force as “justified to prevent Donald Trump from becoming president”. This equates to 26 million adults if the findings are applied to the whole population.

Within this mix of increasingly dangerous political rhetoric and violence is America’s “guns epidemic”. According to the FBI, the weapon used by the would-be assassin at the Trump campaign rally, Thomas Matthew Crooks, was an AR-style rifle purchased by his father.

Pape’s survey also found that 7% of respondents supported the use of force “to restore Donald Trump to the presidency”. Of this group, which equates to 18 million adults, around 45% own guns, 40% think the people involved in the Capitol attack were “patriots”, while 10% were either militia members or knew someone who was a militia member.

White Nationalists march at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, 2017.

The reaction to the Trump assassination attempt by some of his most prominent congressional supporters has bordered on the reckless. Ohio Senator J.D. Vance – a potential vice presidential nominee – stated that Joe Biden bore responsibility for the attack. He asserted that the president’s campaign speeches had “led directly” to what transpired in Pennsylvania.

Other GOP elected officials have gone further with wild and dangerous rhetoric. Georgia congressman Mike Collins posted on X that “Joe Biden sent the orders” and called for the Republican district attorney in Butler County, where the assassination attempt took place, to “immediately file charges against Joseph R. Biden for inciting an assassination”.

There is heightened concern as the summer of political conventions by both Republican and Democratic parties get underway. Jacob Ware, a research fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, has stated that these large gatherings “boast the largest collections of party members and leaders throughout the entire election cycle and could therefore attract individuals or groups with a vendetta”.

Read more:
Trump tones down his rhetoric as he prepares for ‘coronation’ at Republican National Convention

Many across the United States, and beyond its shores, will hope the Trump assassination attempt will lead to tempered introspection and reasoned political debate. But others justifiably fear the event could serve as a catalyst for deeper polarisation and further acts of violence. More