Trump's Playbook Exposed: Arrests, Lies and Propaganda

Using the full weight of his presidential authority, the President of the United States has called for the arrest of whoever is responsible for an escalator not working. Yes, an escalator. These are the times we live in. This is Trump’s America. And no wonder the rest of the world is laughing at us.

After his embarrassing time at the United Nations this week, Donald Trump posted a lengthy rant on his state propaganda platform, Truth Social (or as I call it, Trash Social,) about what he called “triple sabotage”:

A REAL DISGRACE took place at the United Nations yesterday — Not one, not two, but three very sinister events! First, the escalator going up to the Main Speaking Floor came to a screeching halt. It stopped on a dime. It’s amazing that Melania and I didn’t fall forward onto the sharp edges of these steel steps, face first. It was only that we were each holding the handrail tightly or it would have been a disaster. This was absolutely sabotage, as noted by a day’s earlier “post” in The London Times that said UN workers “joked about turning off an escalator.” The people that did it should be arrested! Then, as I stood before a Television crowd of millions of people all over the World, and important Leaders in the Hall, my teleprompter didn’t work. It was stone cold dark. I immediately thought to myself, “Wow, first the escalator event, and now a bad teleprompter. What kind of a place is this?” I then proceeded to make a Speech without a teleprompter, which kicked in about 15 minutes later. The good news is the Speech has gotten fantastic reviews. Maybe they appreciated the fact that very few people could have done what I did. And third, after making the Speech, I was told that the sound was completely off in the Auditorium where the Speech was made, that World Leaders, unless they used the interpreters’ earpieces, couldn’t hear a thing. The first person I saw at the conclusion of the Speech was Melania, who was sitting right up front. I said, “How did I do?” And she said, “I couldn’t hear a word you said.” This wasn’t a coincidence, this was triple sabotage at the UN. They ought to be ashamed of themselves. I’m sending a copy of this letter to the Secretary General, and I demand an immediate investigation. No wonder the United Nations hasn’t been able to do the job that they were put in existence to do. All security tapes at the escalator should be saved, especially the emergency stop button. The Secret Service is involved. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

First, an escalator in the UN building stopped while he and Melania were on it. He claimed it could have killed them and demanded the culprits be arrested. Then, his teleprompter glitched for fifteen minutes. Finally, the sound system failed for part of his speech, making it hard for leaders in the hall to hear him. In Trump’s mind, none of this was a coincidence; it was a coordinated effort to humiliate him. He called it a “real disgrace,” demanded the Secretary General investigate, and declared the Secret Service was now involved.

Now, let’s be clear: escalators break. Microphones cut out. Teleprompters freeze. Every one of us has been in a mall when an escalator was down, or at a school assembly where the sound system squealed. Leaders are supposed to roll with it. What makes this dangerous isn’t the malfunction, it’s that the President of the United States sees a global conspiracy against himself in every technical hiccup. And maybe it was a coordinated attack on him, but our President calling for people to be arrested over a broken escalator shows just how far we have fallen as a country.

And here’s why that matters: The United States funds nearly 20 percent of the United Nations’ budget. Billions of our tax dollars keep it functioning. When the president of the country footing the biggest bill accuses the UN of sabotage over an escalator, it’s not just embarrassing; it destabilizes trust in one of the few global institutions meant to prevent wars, fight pandemics, and respond to humanitarian crises. The world watches him spiral, and they see America spiraling with him. This creates real concern that the U.S. might cut funding or even withdraw from the UN. And even if that sounds unlikely, the message is clear: the world is getting more dangerous. Desperate nations, watching America pull away, may feel freer to do desperate things.

And then, as if that wasn’t embarrassing enough, he followed it up with this:

“Kamala Harris, who is DUMB AS A ROCK, is going around and using, as a standard part of her Speech on why she lost the Election, that 2024 was the ‘closest Presidential Election in the 21st Century.’ Everyone knows this is a lie, and was covered as such by Fox News!”

I get it. You don’t have to like your prior opponent. But when you’re president, you don’t stand on the world stage and call the former Vice President “dumb as a rock.” That’s not governing. That’s schoolyard taunting. That is not how the President of the United States should be acting.

And here’s the kicker: Kamala Harris wasn’t lying. The 2024 election was decided by just 1.3 percent, about one vote out of every hundred. That’s razor-thin. Trump wants you to believe it was a landslide. It wasn’t. It was one of the closest elections of this century, and the truth matters. Because when leaders lie about the size of their victory, they aren’t just rewriting history. They’re erasing democracy itself.

When the president lies about his victory and mocks his opponents, it doesn’t stay contained to politics. It seeps into the culture. It shapes how people talk to each other. It rewrites what we consider normal. And the American way of life is also being reshaped, not by strength, but by humiliation.

I was in the car with my kids today when my youngest told me about a projection onto a building in Los Angeles mocking Kash Patel. His face, his already unusual eyes, exaggerated to look even more unusual. We laughed for a moment, because it was absurd. But I stopped. I told my kids: this isn’t normal either. In a decent country, we don’t plaster people’s faces on buildings to humiliate them. And we shouldn’t normally laugh about it either.

But then we talked about “grey area” thinking. How these are unusual times. How resistance takes many forms. And how we can acknowledge that this isn’t the direction we want our country to go, while also recognizing that Kash Patel is a deeply disturbed man in a serious role, doing a terrible job. That is the difference between what Trump is doing and what the people responsible for the Kash Patel protest are doing.

Kash Patel is unqualified, dangerous, and embedded deep in Trump’s machine. The projection wasn’t random cruelty. It was resistance. It was meant to remind people who this man is and what he represents.

Trump’s insults, on the other hand, are cruelty for cruelty’s sake. They are a tool of power. They’re meant to belittle, humiliate, and break down respect for anyone who dares oppose him.

Then came another rant:

“The Democrats want to leave DEAD PEOPLE on Medicaid and Social Security rolls, so that Criminals can continue to be allowed to receive that payment, and steal their money.”

This is not policy. This is propaganda.

Here’s the truth: the Social Security Administration maintains what’s called the Death Master File. Every month, deaths are reported by states and families, and benefits are stopped. Do errors happen? Yes. Sometimes there are delays. Sometimes families don’t report deaths immediately. But the idea that Democrats, or anyone, want to keep paying benefits to dead people is absurd. In fact, an inspector general report found that fraud from “deceased beneficiaries” makes up less than 0.01 percent of all payments. It’s not systemic. It’s not a conspiracy. It’s just the messy reality of any large system. I can tell you this with certainty: no one in either party wants to pay dead people. This is not how government works. This is not how Social Security works. This is a lie.

But Trump repeats it. He repeats it because he knows that repetition makes lies stick. He repeats it because he knows that his followers don’t question him, they parrot him. Say it once, it’s a joke. Say it ten times, it’s a headline. Say it a hundred times, and it’s gospel. That’s the dictator’s playbook.

And while he spreads lies, he also wages vendettas. This week, MSNBC reported that prosecutors in Virginia are preparing to indict former FBI Director James Comey for perjury tied to testimony he gave in 2020. The statute of limitations is about to expire, so the timing is no accident.

Trump has hated Comey ever since 2017, when Comey confirmed that Trump was under investigation and refused to pledge loyalty. Trump fired him. He attacked him. And now, years later, his prosecutors are digging up old testimony to indict him.

Here’s the truth: I don’t like James Comey. Never did. But whether I like him or the President likes him doesn’t matter. What matters is this: no president should weaponize the justice system against his enemies. And make no mistake, this is the weaponization of justice. Every president before Trump understood that the Department of Justice was supposed to be independent. It was never meant to be the president’s personal law firm. Trump has blown through that norm. And the result is a justice system that looks less like America and more like Russia.

And make no mistake, this is the weaponization of justice. Every president before Trump understood that the Department of Justice was supposed to be independent. It was never meant to be the president’s personal law firm. Trump has blown through that norm.

We are already seeing it in action. The U.S. Attorney for Virginia, Erik Siebert, reportedly refused to indict James Comey (and other perceived opponents). Within days, he was gone, replaced by Lindsey Halligan, a loyalist with zero prosecutorial experience. That’s not a coincidence.

And yes, this bleeds into the personal: Comey’s daughter, Maurene, was a respected federal prosecutor working on cases like Epstein and Maxwell. She was abruptly fired this summer. She’s now suing, saying it was politically motivated. She warned her former colleagues: “Fear is the tool of a tyrant.”

So when I say “no president should weaponize the justice system,” I mean all of this. Dismissing prosecutors who won’t roll over. Replacing them with loyalists. Purging staff with ties to those you despise. That isn’t leadership. It’s coercion. It’s tyranny masquerading as policy.

Meanwhile, the culture wars rage on. This week, Trump’s administration pulled $15 million in grants from New York City schools because those schools allow transgender kids to use bathrooms and play sports that match their gender identity. They’re threatening schools in Chicago and Fairfax next.

Who gets hurt? Kids. More than 8,500 underserved New York students will lose funding. Funding that pays for after-school programs. Funding that pays for food. Funding that pays for teachers and supplies. And here’s the kicker: these weren’t just any schools. They were Title I schools. The schools serving our poorest kids. Trump isn’t punishing bureaucrats or politicians. He’s punishing children.

It’s not about protecting children. It’s about punishing them. It’s about stoking hate. Because hate is the only thing Trump knows how to sell.

And then Lindsey Graham said something a senior United States senator never should.

On Fox News, he declared, “Trump 2028. I hope this never ends.”

The 22nd Amendment, passed after FDR served four terms, limits presidents to two terms. It’s black and white. Clear as day. No president gets a third. Graham knows that. But Trump has already been selling “Trump 2028” merchandise. He’s already testing the waters.

And this isn’t new. Back in 2018, Trump openly praised Xi Jinping for making himself “president for life.” He said maybe America should try that someday. People laughed it off. Now he’s testing it again.

Even joking about a third term is dangerous. Because jokes become slogans. Slogans become movements. Movements become “what ifs.” And “what ifs” become reality. Graham, pathetic as always, was desperate enough for Trump’s attention to normalize the unthinkable.

And then there’s the absurdity. Trump’s White House unveiled a “Presidential Walk of Fame.” Every president in history, framed in gold. Except Biden. Where Biden’s portrait should hang, Trump put a photo of an autopen machine. And of course, multiple portraits of himself.

This is not harmless. It is propaganda. Authoritarians have always used public spaces to elevate themselves and diminish rivals. They erase their opponents. They glorify themselves. They rewrite history in real time. And they do it with our tax dollars. Because we’re paying for Trump’s hallway of propaganda.

So let’s take stock. A president who sees sabotage in escalators. A president who calls his opponent “dumb as a rock.” A president who lies about Democrats paying dead people. A president who pressures prosecutors to indict people he doesn’t like. A president who punishes schools over bathrooms. A senator who normalizes a third term. A White House hallway turned into a shrine of petty propaganda.

It’s exhausting. But more than that, it’s dangerous.

And yet, amid the chaos, there are cracks of hope.

This week, a federal judge ruled that Trump cannot force states to cooperate with immigration enforcement in order to receive FEMA disaster relief. Translation? If a hurricane floods your neighborhood, if a tornado rips your roof off, if a wildfire burns your home, you will still get federal help. No matter what your governor says about immigration. Trump tried to hold disaster victims hostage to his deportation agenda. The courts said no.

Even Joe Rogan, someone I do not agree with, do not like, and do not listen to, drew the line when Jimmy Kimmel was suspended for telling the truth. Rogan told conservatives that if they support censorship, they’re “crazy.” I never thought I’d be thankful for Joe Rogan. But here we are. If even voices I consider harmful can stand up for free speech, then the line still exists.

And maybe the brightest light of all came from Arizona. Democrat Adelita Grijalva won her special election by more than 40 points. That’s not a win. That’s a landslide. And it gives Democrats enough votes to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files, something Trump has tried desperately to block. He has thrown distraction after distraction to keep those secrets buried. Now, because people showed up and voted, the truth may finally see daylight. This is why voting matters. People who felt powerless made their voices heard, and they shifted power. That’s how change happens. That’s how secrets come to light. That’s how accountability begins.

Here’s what I know. Every dictator’s playbook eventually runs out of pages. And Trump’s is getting thinner by the minute.

So tonight I give you both the warning and the hope. The warning: Trump is not just embarrassing us, he is dismantling us. The hope: the cracks are showing, the resistance is growing, and the truth is still stronger than the lies.

I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather