Trumpism

Trumpism is an authoritarian movement that consists of the political ideologies and political movement associated with Donald Trump and his political base. Scholars and historians have identified Trumpism as consisting of a wide range of right-wing ideologies such as right-wing populism, national conservatism, neo-nationalism, and neo-fascism. Trumpist rhetoric heavily features anti-immigrant, xenophobic, nativist, and racist attacks against minority groups. Other identified aspects include conspiracist, isolationist, Christian nationalist, protectionist, anti-feminist, and anti-LGBT beliefs. Trumpists and Trumpians are terms that refer to individuals exhibiting its characteristics.

According to Peter E. Gordon, a historian of philosophy and critical theorist, the distinguishing mark of Trumpism is that it is authoritarian, meaning that Trumpists do not want presidential power to be limited by the Constitution or by the rule of law. It has been referred to as an American political variant of the far right and the national-populist and neo-nationalist sentiment seen in multiple nations worldwide from the late 2010s to the early 2020s. Though not strictly limited to any one party, Trump supporters became the largest faction of the United States Republican Party, with the remainder often characterized as "the elite" or "the establishment" in contrast. In response to the rise of Trump, there has arisen a Never Trump movement.

Some commentators have rejected the populist designation for Trumpism and view it instead as part of a trend towards a new form of fascism or neo-fascism, with some referring to it as explicitly fascist and others as authoritarian and illiberal. Others have more mildly identified it as a specific light version of fascism in the United States. Some historians, including many of those using a new fascism classification, write of the hazards of direct comparisons with European fascist regimes of the 1930s, stating that while there are parallels, there are also important dissimilarities. Certain characteristics within public relations and Trump's political base have exhibited symptoms of a cult of personality.

The label Trumpism has been applied to national-conservative and national-populist movements in other democracies. Many politicians outside of the United States have been labeled as staunch allies of Trump or Trumpism (or even as their countries' equivalent to Trump) by various news agencies; among them are Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, Geert Wilders of Netherlands, Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey, Viktor Orbán of Hungary, Jacob Zuma of South Africa, Shinzo Abe of Japan, Javier Gerardo Milei of Argentina and Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea.