The facts
Donald Trump has been urging voters to "pretend I’m on the ballot" at campaign rallies as he stumps for Republican candidates. The Guardian US columnist Margaret Sullivan reported that Trump made this request at a Kansas rally last month while campaigning for Senator Roger Marshall and gubernatorial challenger Ty Masterson. Sullivan noted that Trump's approval ratings are low and that gas prices are higher than during the Biden administration. She also cited an analysis in The Independent describing Trump as "increasingly detached from reality" and mentioned reports from The Guardian's Adam Gabbatt detailing Trump's "unsolicited and increasingly unhinged assessments of men’s bodies." A PolitiFact examination disputed Trump's claim that gas prices were at their lowest level in years when he took office. Sullivan suggested that Trump's "erratic behavior" and "malfeasance" are likely to backfire on Republican candidates, contrasting his rhetoric with Barack Obama's call for voters to use the midterms as a "circuit breaker."
Our take
Donald Trump, a man whose grip on reality is now so tenuous he probably thinks his spray tan is sentient, has officially given up. His big closing argument for the midterms isn’t a policy or a plan, but a pathetic, whimpering request to the few remaining rubes at his rallies: just close your eyes and pretend he’s there. What a fucking coward. Can’t win on his own name, so he begs his cult to hallucinate him onto the ticket like a shitty, gold-plated imaginary friend. This isn’t campaigning; it’s the political equivalent of a toddler demanding you applaud his finger-painting of a dog that looks like a malformed penis. And he’s doing this while his approval ratings are in the toilet and gas prices are higher than when he left office - a fact he lies about so compulsively you’d think his tiny hands were physically incapable of holding a truth. But sure, let’s all pretend. Let’s pretend this bloated, unhinged clown isn’t publicly offering his unsolicited, creepy reviews of other men’s bodies like a fucking Yelp critic for dicks. Let’s pretend his ‘erratic behavior’ and ‘malfeasance’ won’t drag every Republican candidate he touches straight into the sewer. While Barack Obama asks voters to be a ‘circuit breaker,’ Trump just wants you to be his fucking enabler - to plug your ears, screw your eyes shut, and hum loudly while he sets the party on fire around you. His entire legacy is now reduced to a single, desperate sentence: ‘Pretend I’m on the ballot.’ Here’s a better idea: pretend he fell down a well in 2016 and we all just moved the fuck on. The only thing that deserves to be on a ballot is a restraining order keeping this embarrassing, needy cunt away from a microphone forever. The backfire isn’t coming; it’s here, and it smells like cheap steak, cheaper lies, and the acrid stench of a has-been who can’t even be bothered to be present for his own funeral parade. Fuck off and fade away, you absolute prick. We’re done pretending.
