In our last paper, Our Leadership Crisis Part 3, we analyzed the Trump phenomena through the lens of Intersubjective Self Psychology (ISP), and it is our objective in the following pages to better understand the motivation and beliefs of Trump’s most fanatical supporters through this same lens. We will also use ISP to better understand group process, an echo chamber effect that those in need of “something” find it and how an Intersubjective group process ferments an explosion of fulfillment and satisfaction and belonging and the experience of “finding one’s calling” to better understanding the powerful role of the group process in groups such as QAnon, Proud Boys, and others. The algorithmic psychological power of finding groups of others who think like me, or finding a leader to finally believe in, or having what I think consistently, validates and affirms and fulfills psychological needs at least temporarily. The bottom line is that this shared psychological mindset makes these groups especially vulnerable to restorative fantasies of power, grandiosity, paranoia, revenge, the Big Lie and the likelihood for more violence.

From the perspective of Intersubjective Self Psychology all human beings are motivated by what we call the “leading edge”, a progressive developmental drive for healthy selfhood and positive loving relationships characterized by hope, honesty, and love, and on the other hand, The “trailing edge”, a conservative self-protective need arising out of past psychological trauma, characterized by fear, defensiveness and distrust. One or the other of these dimensions is often dominant, determining the person’s primary orientation to self and relationships. Traumatized people often organize themselves around trailing edge fears and defenses (and of those we include victims of acute trauma, but also those who have endured chronic trauma from hostile, neglectful or rejectionist parents). These people organize themselves around a grandiose fantasy about themselves (a genius, the best ever, the most successful) which protects against a deep feeling of worthlessness and self-loathing. On the other hand, they also see themselves as victims, blaming others for their own perceived failures, repeating the traumas of the past, living in all of these experiences represent what we call the trailing edge of history and the trailing edge of failed leadership. In some extreme cases these people cannot, under any circumstances, allow their grandiosity to be challenged or their enemies to win. Either would be devastating. Donald Trump is just such a “trailing edge” person, traumatized by his childhood family relationships, and as we shall see many of his followers have followed a parallel psychological trajectory of discontent, shame and a need for redemption. Those who are trapped in the trailing edge of their self-experience have unmet psychological needs and vulnerabilities that leave them more or less susceptible to beliefs which espouse a group self. Merger with the group around these shared often false beliefs, appears to fill those unmet needs, like drugs, alcohol or any addictive experience. What is most powerful here, is that the need to be understood or find others who feel like oneself, or to find someone or something one can believe in, are not unhealthy needs in themselves. These needs are not the problem, but the manner in which they seek to fulfil them is.

It is intolerable to live in fear, dread and a general sense of hopelessness. Believing in a lie which represents the world as you wish it to be becomes a means of temporally lifting oneself out of despair or any dysphoric state. These lies may be a means to a political end if one is a politician concerned with power and control. Lying to those who are discontent and dysphoric offers an antidote to their pain. And, if the lie is acknowledged by a group think, it becomes a powerful tool to anesthetize the pain and lift one out of the depths of one’s fears and dreads, the traumatic or trailing edge of their experience. When a President tells a Big Lie, their influence is exponentially impactful because the reverential power of the office comes with the seal of the United States of America. When Trump began telling the Big Lie, months before the election, as the polls began to demonstrate that he would likely lose, he provided for himself and his followers a soft landing and then a long runway to fully expose the Lie and use whatever means possible including violence to fulfill his grandiosity and avoid the humiliating shame of being the loser.

The power of groupthink is the hope that one is finally understood by like-minded others who alleviate these unmet needs. When these needs are hopelessly unmet, the antidote to alienation, aloneness and hopelessness can be found in groups of others who are also in need and who find relief in many of the groups we will be discussing.

It is our belief that a substantial portion of the fanatical Trump followers are people who are trapped in the trailing edges of their felt experience. Again, this does not include all Trump followers, such as those who voted for him who are single issue voters, like abortion, Israel, or the stock market. However, the psychological fragility of people who are drawn to cult groups, militias, religious fanaticism, their psychological vulnerability leaves them susceptible to authoritarian leaders and power hungry politicians whose moral core is empty. It is our belief that the primary motivation for many if not all of the people attracted to these groups is not generative love, a powerful motive of our leading edge experiences. Openness to diversity, an openness to see oneself in all human beings, a belief in a pluralistic society are hallmarks of those living leading edge experiences. Karen Steiner, a behavioral economist, said that those who favor homogeneity, do not tolerate diversity, are suspicious of those with different ideas, that these people have “an authoritarian predisposition”. These people we believe reside in the traumas of their pasts, in the trailing edge of their experience, and fearful of the repetitions of past trauma. With this in mind, we want to answer the following question: Why did the people in these groups accept and support Donald Trump’s Big Lie? More specifically, what are the powerful psychological forces that have and continue to bring together those drawn into the vortex of these fomenting ideas? In the following section we will consider several groups, members of which participated in the Capitol Insurrection of January 6. Each group has had a special relationship to Donald Trump and to varying degrees they all bought into the Big Lie (as well as many smaller lies) and all these groups continue to be active and in several cases threatening, despite Trump’s forced retirement.

White Voters: Shame and anxiety about lost white privilege

The Horatio Alger Myth promoted the idea that perseverance, hope, honesty and hard work would inevitably lead to success and well-being. Combined with the American doctrine of Manifest Destiny and exceptionalism, we are led to believe that through strength of character and resolve, a successful and psychologically fulfilling life is within each and every American. Failure to accomplish these mythical goals through one’s personal strivings is felt to be either a personal failure, or the fault of “others” who have conspired to deprive one of the rightful opportunity for success. The persistent weakness of many mid-western economies which was worsened by a prolonged and uneven recovery from the 2008 recession, resulted in chronic unemployment and the psychological sequelae of depression and drug addiction. Failure has haunted a large part of America, resulting in a long and damaging trailing edge of shattered dreams and searing shame. Fertile soil for the exhortation and lies of a grandiose leader such as Donald Trump.

Trump’s first major lie, his battle cry to Make America Great Again was rooted in the same Anglo-Saxon idea of threatened American exceptionalism. Many American presidents and politicians have used similar expressions but Trump made it the centerpiece of his political life with all of its inherent meanings, that is its racism, virulent patriotism, xenophobia and conspiracy based ideas that American values were being destroyed by immigrants and foreigners. Following the election of Barrack Obama in 2008, the GOP made American Exceptionalism a talking point while at the same time spreading lies regarding Obama’s citizenship and his jihadi sympathies. Trump adopted the idea of American exceptionalism and pushed its’ nativist overtones and racial dog whistles, all embedded in Make America Great Again. In the last four years, those that are prone to believe in the decaying of America, were drawn to MAGA as their last great hope. Many of the fantasies of this Intersubjective group think, disseminated through the push of a button online, became attractive to different people drawn in by their specific psychological vulnerabilities.

Rightwing Militias: Generations of distrust and rage

At the January 6 insurrection there were participants from several right wing militia groups which have been active in the United States, and to an extent in other countries. Variously named and organized they are “The Proud Boys”, “The Boogaloo Boys” and “the Oath Keepers” etc. Although the history of these groups is often unclear, they are current manifestations of militia groups which have been active in the US back to the early 1970 with roots in the chaos of the Vietnam War era and still earlier movements such as the Ku Klux Klan. They share a set of common preoccupations and goals. A military form of organization, set of values, and method of military style combat with appropriate weaponry and tactics. A racist, white nationalist perspective regarding the threat posed by non-white groups, communistic and deep state politicians. A fundamentally paranoid worldview which views all others as hostile enemies in need of extinction, at least exclusion. And in many cases an apocalyptic vision of impending racial and religious warfare in which the white Christian race will finally triumph over the heathen peoples and nations resulting in a pan national Christianity. To these groups Donald Trump’s racist lies, white nationalist dog whistles, fundamentalist Christian social agenda and active undermining of government justified their joining in the grandiose bond as a means of realizing their cryptopsychotic beliefs and paranoid agenda. These people (men and women) view Trump as their President who will lead them forward in their crusade to “make America Great again” by attacking and taking back their government from the control of the socialistic, Democrats, Jewish, Satanic Cabal. As we will see in a moment these delusional beliefs and dangerous intentions have a lot in common with Qanon and in fact some militia members on January 6 were clad in Qanon inspired apparel.

In other words, these militia groups provide their members with an explanation and a set of values which gives meaning to a complex political, social and economic reality. Thus the trailing edge is given coherence and motivation to overcome shame and resentment by means of fantasies of warfare, and at times, overt acts of violence. The simple organization of the social world into “us and them” and the clear solution via total war and complete victory serves in fantasy to repair damaged selves and chronic shame. This social bond of loyalty to a leader like President Trump creates a readiness to take action. As a result, in the last few months of his Presidency, Donald Trump turned to these groups, instructing them to “stand back and stand by” and then summoned them to the Washington D.C. where he ordered them to storm the Capitol in order to block the tallying of the electoral college votes. Trump exhorted them with the Big Lie and the mob marched forth to fulfill “their President’s” orders. In those dreadful hours of violence the cryptopsychotic beliefs became actionable as the reality of the grandiose bond with the leader broke through the thin membrane of delusion, resulting in mayhem and death.

Evangelicals: Religious ecstasy, moral delusions and fanaticism

In a 2018 poll conducted by the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, an evangelical Institution outside of Chicago found that over half of evangelicals are strongly convinced that mainstream media produced fake news. Distrust in the media opens the door for evangelicals to turn to alternative and fringe news sources, including those that traffic in conspiracy theories. In addition politicians like Ted Cruz and later Donald Trump stoked Christian fears through imagery of pagan hordes invading America with the intent to rob, rape and otherwise desecrate God’s nation. Christian nationalists see America as God’s chosen people and if that covenant is broken the nation literally risks destruction.

These Evangelical church communities have been an essential, powerful part of the Republican base for many years. Motivating these groups is a fantastical faith in fundamentalist Christian principles and social beliefs. Beyond the well-known opposition to abortion, Evangelicals share with the militia groups a fundamentalist world view in which Christianity is at war with the non-Christian societies and non-white races. Their mission is to promote Christian values and policies with the intention of taking over the control of government to achieve these ends. These groups see themselves in messianic terms, as at war with the non-Christian world, and they have viewed Trump as a leader sent from God to bring about the triumph of Christianity, the second coming of Christ on earth and the imposition of the Kingdom of God.

Christian faith and beliefs offer many hope and salvation but, these beliefs overloaded with paranoia, delusion and fantasy have become linked to the militias and the white nationalist racist agenda. No means is too extreme if the goal of a restoration of God’s kingdom on earth is the result. As a result there were many who stormed the Capitol building who felt that they were fulfilling not only Trump’s will, but more importantly, God’s. This is the most potent well of extremism and a historically familiar and terrible manifestation of the danger of religious fervor. When a person feels that “God is on my side” any atrocity is permissible.

Qanon: paranoid delusions and manic excitement

Over the past year we have seen emerging from the dark recesses of the internet a new and especially bizarre movement, Qanon. This group has recently come onto the national political stage through the Capitol insurrection (where there were many believers) and the allegiance of some newly elected politicians who voice support for Qanon’s beliefs.

Trump’s big lie is simple: He won the election by a landslide, but democrats and radical associates conspired to steal his victory from him. On the other hand, the lies of Qanon are bizarrely complex and phantasmagoric. For most people Qanon’s paranoid fantasies are immediately rejected as almost laughably false. But what is most remarkable and important, is the way the very outrageousness of Qanon is a large part of its appeal. Certainly these ideas are no more fantastic than those of a jihadist suicide bomber who believes he will be given a new home in heaven with 72 virgins at his beck and call. And at the heart of the Qanon worldview is the figure of Donald Trump who is seen as a powerful ally and avenger who is secretly investigating the cabal of pedophile cannibalistic democrats, and who will use his power to bring them to justice.

Let’s consider a first-hand account of a Qanon adherent, who eventually left the cult and rejected Qanon beliefs. In an article in the New York Times on January 30, 2021, Sabrina Tayernise published a profile of Lenka Perron, a middle aged woman and longtime democrat, who was involved in the Qanon online underground of conspiracy theorists. As a means to shed light on the psychological underpinnings of a crucial part of Donald Trump’s base, we will now look briefly at Perron’s account of the experience of being a Qanon member. In many ways Perron’s experience is typical of many of Trump’s followers and her motivations can be applied to other groups.

During the 2016 campaign Perron was an enthusiastic Bernie Sanders supporter. “He put into words what I couldn’t figure out but I was seeing around me, The middle class was shrinking. The 1 percent and corporations having more control and taking more of the money.” Perron became an active member of the Sanders campaign and believed that he would be supported by the Democratic establishment. When Sander’s lost the primary she turned to the leaked emails to find out why. As she read deeper and deeper into the emails, she began to see a pattern of conspiracy which would lead her into the Qanon world.

The emails were Ms. Perron’s doorway to the conspiracy world, and she found others there too. She was no longer a lonely victim of a force she did not understand, but part of a bigger community of people seeking the truth. She loved the feeling of common purpose. They were learning together how to research, looking up important people in the emails and figuring out how to trace them back to big donors.

“There was this excitement,” Ms. Perron said. “We were joining forces to finally clean house. To finally find something to explain why we were suffering.”
The community was growing, and also going to darker places. Ms. Perron remembers watching shared video appearing to link the Washington pizza parlor to Mr. Podesta, Mrs. Clinton, and a child sex trafficking ring. The dots were hazy, but she and her newfound friends on Facebook and Reddit drew bright lines connecting them. It sounds crazy now, she said, but at that time it felt real and disturbing that sometimes she felt physically ill.
“It was all of us,” She said of the early months of her immersion. “It was these puzzle pieces that we all got to play around with. We were all sort of authoring this.”

Ms. Perron describes how these ideas were comforting to her, a way to get her bearings in a chaotic world that she felt increasingly unequal and rigged against the middle class like her. These stories offered agency. Evil cabals could be defeated. A diffuse sense that things were out of control could not. She said:

“Q managed to make us feel special, that we were being given very critical information that was going to save all that is good in the world, and the United States.” she said. “We felt we were coming from a place of moral superiority. We were part of a special club.”

Charles Strozier states:

The fundamentalist mindset, wherever it occurs, is composed of distinct characteristics, including dualistic thinking: paranoia and rage in a group context, and apocalyptic orientation that incorporates distinct perspectives on time, death, and violence; a relationship to charismatic leadership and its totalized conversion experience”.

“Where we go one, we go all”. This organizing principle of QAnon reflects the felt experience of personal isolation and anomie that leads one to be vulnerable to the group experience of QAnon, the felt experience of a “we” for which one searches. This trailing edge of experience is filled with anxiety, fears, emptiness and sometimes a desperation for answers for personal meaning. The “righteousness” of a QAnon member; the “depravity” of the other; the suspiciousness of the “deep state”; the organized experiences of Q’s truth; and in some members the willingness to fight the other because time for the righteous” is running out. These qualities of QAnon lead to an addictive adherence. It is this search for an interdependence and a “we” that drives members who feel otherwise adrift and psychologically unmoored.

QAnon has many of the qualities of a fundamentalist organization as described by Stozier. A December poll by NPR found that 17% of Americans believed the core belief of QAnon that America was being run by a child sex traffic ring of Satan worshipping Democrats. According to Qanon, Trump was recruited by military leaders who believe these ideas and they believe that under his leadership the cabal will be broken and its leaders, including President Biden, Hilary Clinton, President Obama and many other celebrities will be tried for treason and executed. Begun by an anonymous account on 4chan message board, Q predicted that Trump would restore America to its greatness. Since the election, Q’s account and “drops”’ have been few though many of his followers hold fast to the idea that Q will return.

We have explained why these several groups have believed Trump’s Big Lie and made it one of the central organizing and motivating principles of their communities. But what happens now, when crucial predictions and expectations don’t come true, such as Trump is the loser and is no longer president?

In the case of Qanon followers, many believe that they simply have misunderstood Q and his ideas. They maintain that since the election was stolen that when the truth about the election comes out they will be vindicated. However, since the election Q has disappeared. Before the election, Q posted 10-20 times a day. Now, almost never. The result is that the true believers think that Q is waiting for the Coming Storm or The Great Awakening. Despite all evidence to the contrary, many Qanon members believe that “the bottom line is, we trust the plan”, basically reformulating the belief and going on believing. The search to belong, the existential search for a connection that relieves the pain of aloneness, pushes these believers to tolerate Trump stepping down, because it is far more psychologically damaging to be alone than it is to accept that he lost the election.

Since the Capitol insurrection the militias groups have been under investigation by the FBI and an aggressive effort to identify, arrest and change many militia group leaders has stressed the organizational integrity of many of the groups. For some their faith in Trump’s leadership was shaken and for others not. The Big Lie lives on as a justification for rebellion. Many of these militias have a long history and the movement remains vital. In the past month several groups, such as the proud boys, have lost their leadership and infighting has led to riffs. New groups have been organized, some with greater and more aggressive militancy. For many in the militias, the Capitol insurrection was a great victory and evidence that a new Civil War is possible. Images of the violence have been shared across the internet for recruitment and inspiration. Membership is up. The fact is that the fragmentation of militia groups is not proof of their weakening influence or a decrease in the threat level. They continue to recruit new members and plan more violence.

The Evangelical Christian Nationalist movement remains as strong and influential as ever. They cling to the Big Lie, as they are also reaping the benefits of many of Trump’s decisions and policies, especially the newly packed federal court system and right wing Supreme Court. They remain bent on the creation of a Christian nation free of unbelievers and foreigners. Trump’s role as god’s warrior may have faded and some leaders have recently opposed the movement’s alliance with the past President. But, faced with an increasingly diverse society and open political system, fear regarding perceived threats to Christianity has made the fantasy of God’s Kingdom on earth an ever more desperate and necessary goal. Numerous Republican candidates aggressively court the Evangelical voters, while racist state governments pass numerous laws to suppress the non-white vote. Radical fringe elements of the Evangelical movement continue to harbor fantasies of a holy war, infiltrating militia groups and even Qanon, contributing an even more potent justification for violence.

While it makes sense for extremist groups to organize around fantasies of the grandiose leader what about mainstream political parties? In fact, seventy-five percent of the Republican Party still believe the Big Lie. Many of their leaders continue to promote the Lie and use it for a justification of the pervasive voter suppression movement throughout the country. This is the most dangerous legacy of Trump’s Lie, the fact that one of the two major political parties in the Nation remains enthralled by a paranoid lie regarding the opposition. Republicans find themselves in an endless trap of lies, promoting conspiracy theories and extremist right wing policies regarding fantasied enemies and supporting authoritarian anti-democratic demagoguery masquerading as leadership. The parties’ expressed beliefs and policy positions have negatively affected its electability, at least on the national level, so voter suppression, gerrymandering, and the subversion of election infrastructure, has become the primary methods to maintain power. In addition, the possibility of a successful Democratic administration has necessitated relentless opposition and political obstructionism. Trump continues his hold on the party “base” as well as the party’s fundraising capability, distorting the Party even further, as many Republican leaders journey to Mar a Lago to seek the exiled leader’s counsel and blessing.

“The Winner”: Joe Biden’s Quest for Restoration

Obviously Joe Biden has a lot of work to do. Containing a pandemic, reducing gun violence, preventing economic collapse, fighting racial inequality, and implementing a fair policy towards immigration, These are all major challenges.

And he will do this in a country in which Trump’s Big Lie lives on. Even now just months since the Capital insurrection the Republican party is trying to alter history through lies. The riot was caused by Antifa. It was no worse than Black Lives Matter protests. The rape of the Capital was no worse than the prior summer’s marches and scuffles with the police of other protests. Voting must be legally restricted to prevent future conspirators from robing Republicans of elections. In other words, the Republican Party remains committed to the Big lie. The Lie will outlive the liar. The damage which Trump has done to the body politic endures.

Joe Biden’s career and life have been shadowed by major losses as well as powerful personal ambition and quite a bit of success. In the midst of a long career as a Senator, he lost two bids for the Presidency, efforts which were undone to some extent by his own hubris and mistakes. Finally, it was the death of his beloved son Beau which underlay Biden’s decision to seek the presidency once again. Specifically, it was his quest to fulfill his dead son’s exhortation to run again (perhaps to fulfil Beau’s destiny), as the bereaved father, placing aside his own needs, to live up to what he imagines to be Beau’s wishes (expectations). Biden has said that he often stands in front of the mirror and asks Beau: “How am I doing?” An apparent effort to maintain the idealized bond which he shared with Beau. His relationship with Beau also provides an intersubjective dyad of two who are residing in the leading edge of their hopes and dreams. In leading edge experiences, we feel the hopefulness of living and acting with healthy ambition and living by and with principles that enrich us and keep us alive and vital.

Hence, Biden’s motivations to seek the presidency are fundamentally different from Donald Trump’s. To be clear, anyone who has succeeded politically, as Joe Biden has, is motivated by ambition and the need to be seated in the chair of the most powerful person in the world. The chair behind the resolute desk is occupied by someone whose sense of herself or himself must have a healthy sense of grandiosity and ambition. However, Biden has been as close to being a selfless campaigner, president elect and now President as any in our nation’s history. Rather than seeking self-aggrandizement and power he seems focused on getting things right, on seeking expertise and wise counsel and making use of his power to craft a professional, competent and ethical administration.

Of course, Biden’s leading edge strivings will be severely tested as he confronts the dark reality of our toxic political world. The restoration we long for cannot be a return to the days before Trump, because as malignant as Trump has been, he marshalled a vast population of followers who attached themselves to his grandiosity as an antidote to their own quiet suffering. Their suffering will have to be addressed. The restoration we speak about is a return to economic fairness, social and political order, belief in truth, and a consistent rule of law that we believe most Americans still hold dear. This is a tall order.