For many observers of the upcoming presidential election, especially abroad, Donald Trump and his MAGA-inflected Republican Party represent a threatening stress test for American democracy.

Historians have come forward with the analysis that Trump now leads a movement close to fascism, Trump himself has spoken of “enemies within,” and he and his supporters held a mass rally with racist rhetoric at a venue in New York City that was already open for a notorious Nazi gathering was known. The Second World War and its language are characterized by violent images.

But in the world of Trump and his supporters and surrogates on the campaign trail, it is the Democrats who are responsible for the degraded discourse in American politics. Their rhetoric is a sign that they are demonizing the other side. It is Kamala Harris who is far outside the American mainstream. It's Joe Biden who is a Marxist. It is the Democratic Party that is planning a complete overhaul of the American way of life. They even try to take hamburgers away from Americans, they argue.

When millions of American Republicans vote on Tuesday, they will believe that they are the ones – by voting for Trump – who are saving American democracy.

The “mirror world” of alternative reality that Trump has constructed for himself and his supporters portrays them as victims of their political opponents, even though Trump frequently uses insults and heated comments. And he is casting himself as a savior from that persecution, justifying his election again in recent days on the grounds that he can only fix the country the Democrats have broken, a reprise of his 2016 slogan: “I alone can fix it.” .

The mirror world effect is a feature of the 2024 campaign – a place where Trump's liabilities are twisted to become those of his opponents, a place where he can insult people but it's an outrage when others do, a place , in which Trump saves democracy despite his own attempts to overturn an election.

Perhaps no incident shows more clearly how the same word can be twisted differently in this underbelly America than the way this week's “garbage” gaffe played out.

At a rally in Arizona last Thursday, Trump called the U.S. a “dustbin” because of migrants, pointing out that he had never used the term to describe the country before but that it was accurate even though it had previously been used by The people around Harris were “scum” and “absolute garbage.” Days later, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe called Puerto Rico a “floating island of trash” at a rally at Madison Square Garden packed with supporting acts hurling insults and diatribes against perceived enemies.

Trump tried to distance himself from the comedian, saying he didn't know him and claiming that Puerto Ricans loved him. “Every time I go outside I see someone from Puerto Rico. They hug me and kiss me,” he told Fox host Sean Hannity. He hasn't taken back his own comments that the entire country is trash.

President Joe Biden then said Trump supporters were “trash,” but then clarified that he specifically meant Hinchliffe, the comedian, and that a critical apostrophe should be added: This Trump supporter is trash, not the lot of them. Kamala Harris also said she disagreed with calling Trump supporters by name, instead focusing her comments on the former president himself.

Sensing an opportunity for a campaign stunt akin to manning the fryer at McDonald's, Trump donned an orange vest and jumped into a Trump-branded garbage truck for a short ride. He then wore the vest during a speech and joked that the outfit made him look thinner.

“Joe Biden’s comments were the direct result of Kamala’s decision to portray anyone who doesn’t vote for her as evil and inhumane,” Trump said. “And we know they believe that because look how they treated you, like trash.”

He has since called Kamala Harris a “low IQ person” and “sleazy” and claimed she is “stone stupid.” He called Biden a “stupid bastard.” At a later rally, where some supporters in bright construction vests stood on stage behind him, Trump again brought up the “garbage” comment and said his supporters were “far higher quality” than Harris' or Biden's.

But in Trump's words, he is simultaneously waging “a campaign of positive solutions” while Harris is waging “a campaign of hate.”

In a conversation with right-wing media star Tucker Carlson on Thursday, Trump explicitly stated that one of his political opponents, former Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney, was a radical war hawk and needed to use guns herself to deal with the consequences of US involvement in conflicts recognized abroad.

“Let’s put them with a gun that shoots at them with nine barrels. Let's see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are pointed at their face,” he said.

Cheney said the comments were an indication of how dictators destroy free countries. “They threaten to kill those who speak out against them,” Cheney said. “We cannot trust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.”

It's the very line of attack against Trump that Trump has twisted, saying his opponents use harsh language and call him extreme names.

“For the last nine years, Kamala and her party have called us racists, fanatics, fascists, deplorables, irredeemables, and they call me Hitler… They took your money, they opened our borders to criminals… They sent our blood and our treasures to fight in stupid foreign wars – This Tuesday is your chance to stand up and declare that you will no longer take it – VOTE!” He posted on Truth Social this week.

Trump has also continued to claim that Democrats are a threat to democracy, a strategy he adopted this year as he faced a barrage of criminal charges related to his actions to overturn the 2020 election results. He said these allegations were the work of the Biden administration to obstruct its political opponent during an election year, calling it “election interference.”

This line of thought has become a feature of his speeches, and one his allies and supporters now often parrot – that a vote for Trump is a vote to secure democracy. Despite these announcements in his speeches, he is expected to declare victory whether he wins or not, and he and his allies are laying the groundwork for challenging the election results. He referred to his political opponents as an “enemy within” and threatened to prosecute them or use military force against them for unspecified crimes, even leading some of his former aides to label him a fascist. He and his allies instead said comments about the existential threat Trump posed led to assassination attempts against him.