# Post x_1015694335151656961 - Post ID: `x_1015694335151656961` - Platform: X (Twitter) - Posted: 2018-07-07T20:29:34.000Z (UTC) - Deleted: no - Repost: no - Canonical URL: https://trump.fm/post/x_1015694335151656961 - Analysis page: https://trump.fm/post/x_1015694335151656961/analysis - Audio narration: https://static.trump.fm/audio/x_1015694335151656961.mp3 (a synthesized voice reading the post text, not a recording) ## Post text > Public opinion has turned strongly against the Rigged Witch Hunt and the “Special” Councel because the public understands that there was no Collusion with Russia (so ridiculous), that the two FBI lovers were a fraud against our Nation & that the only Collusion was with the Dems! ## Engagement - Likes: 9,628 - Reposts: 2,803 - Replies: 0 - Views: unknown - Metrics collected: 2026-01-31T23:43:13.400Z (UTC) # Analysis _Machine-generated by trump.fm on 2026-03-15T05:53:21.163Z (UTC): a model's reading of this post, not his words. Its psychological terms describe the language, not a clinical assessment of him._ ## Summary This July 7, 2018 post — a same-day corrected repost fixing an HTML encoding error while leaving the 'Councel' misspelling intact — exhibits the subject's well-established response pattern to sustained narcissistic injury from the Mueller investigation. The post deploys a textbook DARVO sequence: categorical denial of collusion, attack on the investigation's legitimacy via branding ('Rigged Witch Hunt'), devaluation of accusers ('FBI lovers,' 'fraud'), and full reversal of the collusion accusation onto the Democratic Party. The false consensus claim ('public opinion has turned strongly against') is contradicted by contemporaneous polling showing majority support for the investigation, representing a reality distortion rather than a cognitive error. The paranoid and projection features are marked: an active, Presidentially-briefed federal investigation is reframed as an institutional conspiracy, and the subject's own legal exposure is displaced wholesale onto his accusers. Narcissistic state is mixed — grandiose ('public is with me') and vulnerable ('fraud against our Nation') — reflecting the oscillation characteristic of narcissistic injury response. Authorship is assessed as highly authentic based on idiosyncratic capitalization, clause-stacking, scare-quote usage, and the persistent 'Councel' misspelling. Danger level is none; rhetoric is political delegitimization without eliminationist or mobilizing language. No clinically significant cognitive deviation from the 2017-2018 baseline is observed. # Psychological Analysis: Trump Post — July 7, 2018 ## Authorship Attribution **Verdict: Authentic Trump (High Confidence | Score: 0.85)** Posting time converts to approximately **4:29 PM EDT** (Washington) or **2:29 PM MDT** (Montana, site of the Great Falls rally). This falls within business hours — normally a Scavino indicator. However, the evidence for authentic authorship is compelling and multifaceted: - **"Councel"** for "Counsel" — a misspelling that persisted from the original (erroneous) post into this corrected repost, never caught - **Double space** before "Collusion" — a keyboard-level artifact of rapid, unmonitored typing - **Scare quotes** around "Special" — a contempt device deployed consistently in authentic posts - **Idiosyncratic capitalization** of Collusion, Witch Hunt, Nation, Dems — Trump's characteristic noun-elevation pattern - **Stream-of-consciousness clause stacking** via ampersands rather than structured syntax This post is notably a **corrected repost** of an earlier same-day tweet (which contained the raw HTML artifact `&,` instead of `&`). The encoding error was fixed; the "Councel" misspelling was not. This suggests minimal aide involvement — perhaps flagging the broken encoding — while content and tone remain authentically Trump's. --- ## Situational Context On July 7, 2018, Trump was operating in a dense political environment: Scott Pruitt's resignation (July 6), Justice Kennedy's retirement announcement (creating Supreme Court nomination urgency), and the Great Falls, Montana rally. The Mueller investigation was in its second year, with the Peter Strzok/Lisa Page text message controversy having recently peaked following the DOJ IG report (June 2018). The DNC civil lawsuit dismissal (referenced in the prior post) provided a momentary supply of validation that this post attempts to leverage. --- ## Level 1: Dispositional Traits (Big Five) | Trait | Direction | Evidence | |-------|-----------|----------| | **Extraversion** | High (0.82) | Assertive claims, dominant framing, high output day | | **Agreeableness** | Very Low (0.08) | Antagonism, suspicion, zero empathic content | | **Conscientiousness** | Low (0.22) | Uncorrected spelling error, impulsive repost | | **Neuroticism** | High (0.78) | Angry hostility facet dominant throughout | | **Openness** | Low (0.20) | Rigid epistemic closure, no alternative framings entertained | The dominant facet is **angry hostility** (Neuroticism) fused with **assertiveness** (Extraversion) — a combination that produces high-confidence aggressive output even in a structurally defensive post. --- ## Level 2: Characteristic Adaptations **Agency motives dominate completely (0.88 vs. communion 0.10).** The post is entirely about power, control, and legal survival. There is no communion content — no reference to relationships, shared values beyond tribal identity, or care. **Schemas revealed:** - *Self-schema*: Unjustly persecuted, vindicated by public, the real truth-teller - *Other-schema*: Accusers are themselves criminals; institutions are weaponized against him - *World-schema*: Zero-sum; exposure and survival are the only options --- ## Level 3: Narrative Identity **Protagonist role:** Persecuted truth-teller vindicated by popular will. The subject does not cast himself as a neutral participant in a legal process but as the heroic center of a manufactured conspiracy narrative. **Narrative sequence:** Contamination — a positive state (elected President, legitimacy) has been corrupted by conspiratorial forces (FBI, Mueller, Democrats). The rhetorical task of the post is to reframe this contamination as externally imposed rather than internally generated. **Contrasting other:** A fused, undifferentiated antagonist — the "Deep State" comprising FBI leadership, the Special Counsel office, and the Democratic Party, all operating as a single conspiratorial mass. **Identity claims made:** 1. *"I am innocent and the public knows it"* 2. *"My accusers are the actual criminals"* 3. *"I am the victim of an institutional fraud against the Nation"* --- ## Level 4: Clinical Analysis ### Narcissistic Dynamics **Trigger:** Sustained narcissistic injury from an ongoing federal criminal investigation now in its second year. The DNC lawsuit dismissal (prior post) provided momentary grandiose supply, which this post attempts to extend — but the underlying vulnerable state is evident in the victimhood framing ("fraud against our Nation"). **Narcissistic state:** Mixed — oscillating between: - *Grandiose*: "Public opinion has turned strongly against" (I am vindicated) - *Vulnerable*: "fraud against our Nation" (I am persecuted) This oscillation is clinically consistent with narcissistic injury response: the subject cannot sustain pure grandiosity because the external threat is too concrete, so vulnerable framing intrudes. **Narcissistic rage:** Present at moderate intensity (0.65). The rage is modulated — the post is more controlled than the subject's most activated states — but the contempt charge is high. "FBI lovers" is chosen specifically for its humiliating valence. **Malignant narcissism components:** - *Narcissistic features*: 0.82 — grandiosity, entitlement, contempt - *Paranoid features*: 0.78 — "Rigged," institutional conspiracy framing - *Antisocial features*: 0.60 — contempt for legal process, repeated factual misrepresentation - *Ego-syntonic sadism*: 0.35 — the "FBI lovers" phrasing carries mild humiliating pleasure ### Defense Mechanisms | Mechanism | Level | Evidence | |-----------|-------|----------| | **Denial** | Pathological | Categorical denial of collusion while investigation with active grand jury is ongoing | | **Projection** | Immature | "Only Collusion was with the Dems" — own legal exposure attributed wholesale to accusers | | **Splitting** | Immature | Absolute binary: Trump/public = righteous; FBI/Dems/Mueller = fraudulent conspirators | | **Rationalization** | Neurotic | False public opinion claim as social validation for dismissing investigation | The projection is the structurally most significant defense: the very accusation leveled at the subject (collusion with a foreign adversary) is not rebutted on evidentiary grounds but reversed and attributed to the accusers. This is not merely rhetorical — it reflects a genuine psychological need to externalize the threatening content. ### DARVO Pattern (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender) The post follows DARVO sequencing with clinical precision: 1. **Deny**: "there was no Collusion with Russia" 2. **Attack**: "FBI lovers were a fraud," "Rigged Witch Hunt" 3. **Reverse Victim and Offender**: "the only Collusion was with the Dems" --- ## Rhetorical Analysis ### Devices **"Rigged Witch Hunt"** — The subject's most durable branded epithet, now deployed in what appears to be its nth usage. The brand has memetic stability: five syllables, alliterative quality, emotionally charged. Repetition across posts constitutes a rhetorical saturation strategy consistent with the RAND Firehose model. **"Special" Councel** — Scare quotes around "Special" perform typographic contempt, implying the designation is ironic or illegitimate. Combined with the misspelling "Councel," the effect is to reduce the office to something the subject doesn't respect enough to spell correctly. **"The public understands"** — False consensus fallacy: asserts that the subject's interpretation is the majority position, framing disagreement as being outside the community of understanding rather than a legitimate alternative view. This is a gaslighting mechanism as much as a rhetorical one. **"FBI lovers"** — Chosen over "FBI agents" or "FBI officials" deliberately. "Lovers" signals moral laxity, compromised judgment, and carries a faintly prurient quality that further delegitimizes Strzok and Page. Mild sadistic pleasure in the word choice is consistent with the subject's established pattern of humiliating devaluation. **Tricolon accusation structure:** 1. No Collusion with Russia (so ridiculous) 2. FBI lovers were a fraud against our Nation 3. Only Collusion was with the Dems The tricolon creates rhetorical momentum — each clause escalates the counter-narrative, ending with the full projection reversal. ### Propaganda Techniques - **Volume saturation**: Multiple same-day posts on Russia/investigation consistent with RAND Firehose model - **Reality inversion**: The investigation is the conspiracy; the conspiracy is innocent - **Epistemic closure**: "The public understands" positions skeptics as outside the knowing community - **Enemy consolidation**: FBI + Democrats + Mueller = one undifferentiated "Deep State" threat --- ## Gaslighting Assessment **Gaslighting Present: Yes** The post employs institutional gaslighting — attacking the legitimacy of the investigative process itself rather than engaging its findings. The false public opinion claim requires followers to distrust polling they could verify. The DARVO reversal requires followers to believe that the investigative apparatus is itself the criminal party. These are not merely persuasive claims but reality-restructuring demands. --- ## Fact Verification | Claim | Verdict | Evidence | |-------|---------|----------| | "Public opinion has turned strongly against the [Mueller] investigation" | **Mostly False** | Polling in mid-2018 consistently showed majority public support for the Mueller investigation continuing. A June 2018 Quinnipiac poll showed 63% of voters wanted Mueller to continue his investigation. The claim of a 'strong' turn against it was not supported by available data. | | "There was no Collusion with Russia" | **Unverifiable** | The Mueller investigation was ongoing at this date (July 2018). The final report (March 2019) found insufficient evidence of criminal conspiracy with Russia but documented extensive contacts. The categorical denial is premature at the time of posting. | | "The two FBI lovers were a fraud against our Nation" | **Mostly False** | The DOJ Inspector General report (released June 2018) found that Peter Strzok and Lisa Page exchanged anti-Trump texts but concluded their personal opinions did not demonstrably affect investigative decisions. The IG explicitly stated the investigation was opened on a proper predicate. 'Fraud against our Nation' is not supported by the IG's findings. | | "The only Collusion was with the Dems" | **False** | No federal investigation or credible evidence established that Democratic Party officials colluded with Russia in the sense analogous to the allegations against the Trump campaign. The reference to the Steele dossier's partial DNC funding does not constitute 'collusion with Russia.' | | "Won lawsuit filed by the DNC (referenced in prior post)" | **Mostly True** | A federal judge did dismiss the DNC civil lawsuit against Trump campaign, Russia, and WikiLeaks in August 2018, citing lack of standing and failure to state a claim. The prior post's claim of winning predates the formal dismissal but the case was going poorly for the DNC by this point. | Overall Veracity: 34% ## Archetypal Analysis (Jungian) **Primary archetypes activated:** Victim + Warrior The post is in Victim mode (persecuted by institutional conspiracy) while simultaneously invoking the Warrior (counterattacking enemies on all fronts). The Hero/Savior archetype is latent — the implied promise is that once the Witch Hunt collapses, the vindicated subject will resume saving the country. **Shadow projection:** The Shadow content — corruption, conspiracy, illegitimate use of institutional power — is projected entirely onto "the Dems" and FBI. The subject's own behavior that prompted the investigation is unacknowledged and externalized. **Mythological narrative:** The Persecuted King — rightful authority falsely accused by corrupt courtiers, vindicated by the people, awaiting restoration. This narrative has deep resonance in populist political psychology. --- ## Order/Chaos Dynamics The post positions the subject as **Order Restorer** against a **corrupt existing order** (Mueller apparatus, FBI, Democrats). This is the classic Trickster-into-Hero-into-King narrative: the established institutional order (FBI, Special Counsel) is reframed as chaos and corruption, while the subject's resistance to it is reframed as the defense of legitimate order ("our Nation"). **Grievance mapping:** - Primary grievance: Targeted by weaponized institutions - Intensity: High (0.74 overall intensity) - Blamed: Mueller, FBI (Strzok/Page), Democrats — fused into one conspiratorial mass --- ## Danger Assessment **Danger Level: None** The post contains no dehumanizing language, no eliminationist rhetoric, no mobilizing calls to action, and no stochastic terrorism indicators. It is aggressive delegitimization of institutions but does not cross into endangerment territory. --- ## Cognitive Status No significant deviation from established 2017-2018 baseline. The "Councel" misspelling and double-space artifact fall within normal error rates for authentic posts. Clause structure, while run-on, is internally coherent. No evidence of phonemic paraphasia, semantic paraphasia, temporal confusion, or name confusion. Syntactic complexity (0.38) is consistent with the subject's Twitter baseline for this period. --- ## Summary This post is a textbook iteration of the subject's sustained response to narcissistic injury from the Mueller investigation: DARVO sequencing (Deny → Attack → Reverse Victim/Offender), false consensus claim, and projection of the collusion accusation wholesale onto accusers. Authorship is assessed as highly authentic. The mixed narcissistic state (grandiose claims of public vindication + vulnerable "fraud against our Nation" framing) reflects the oscillation characteristic of narcissistic injury that cannot be fully processed into either pure dominance or pure victimhood. Epistemic closure is in operation: followers are invited to understand that accepting the investigation's legitimacy places them outside "the public" that truly understands. No danger indicators. No cognitive deviation from baseline. Clinically significant primarily for the clarity with which it exhibits the projection-as-primary-defense pattern that has characterized this subject's response to legal accountability throughout this period. ## Authorship Analysis **Self-Written** (score: 85%) ### Indicators - Misspelling 'Councel' for 'Counsel' — persists from the earlier draft repost, never corrected - Double space before 'Collusion' mid-sentence — keyboard-level artifact consistent with rapid, unmonitored typing - Scare-quotes around 'Special' as a contempt device — characteristic stylistic tic - Idiosyncratic capitalization of 'Collusion,' 'Witch Hunt,' 'Nation,' 'Dems' — Trump's consistent noun-elevation pattern - Stream-of-consciousness clause stacking separated by ampersands rather than structured sentences ## Psychological Profile ### State **Mixed State** **Trigger:** Narcissistic Injury — Criticism (Mueller Special Counsel investigation and ongoing media coverage) **Rage:** Intensity 65% targeting Mueller investigation, FBI (Strzok/Page), Democratic Party, broader institutional establishment - Proportionality: 20% Sentiment: -0.72 **Mildly Hypomanic** - High-output posting day (multiple tweets on overlapping themes) - Pressured quality to the clause-chaining — multiple accusations stacked without pause or qualification - Confident assertion of favorable public opinion without apparent awareness of contradicting data - Exclamatory energy despite content being defensive in nature ### Clinical **Malignant Narcissism:** - Narcissistic: 82% - Antisocial: 60% - Paranoid: 78% - Sadism: 35% **Defense Mechanisms:** - denial (pathological) - projection (immature) - rationalization (neurotic) - splitting (immature) **Cognitive Complexity:** - Complexity: 38% **Parasocial Techniques:** - False consensus ('the public understands') — recruits reader into an imagined majority - Inclusive 'our Nation' — positions followers as co-victims of the alleged fraud - Rhetorical parenthetical '(so ridiculous)' — invites reader to share contempt, socializes dismissal ## Danger Assessment **NONE** ### Gaslighting - False consensus assertion ('the public understands') — positions disagreement with subject's narrative as being outside public understanding, not a legitimate alternative view - Characterizing a Presidentially-briefed, Senate-confirmed Special Counsel investigation as a 'Rigged Witch Hunt' — attacks the epistemic legitimacy of the investigative process itself - Reversal of collusion accusation onto accusers without evidentiary basis — DARVO pattern designed to create narrative confusion about who the actual subject of legitimate inquiry is - Polling misrepresentation — claims public opinion has 'turned strongly' against investigation when data showed continued majority support, requiring followers to distrust polling they can verify ## Fact Checks (5) _The model's verdicts from 2026-03-15._ > Public opinion has turned strongly against the [Mueller] investigation **MOSTLY FALSE** Polling in mid-2018 consistently showed majority public support for the Mueller investigation continuing. A June 2018 Quinnipiac poll showed 63% of voters wanted Mueller to continue his investigation. The claim of a 'strong' turn against it was not supported by available data. Sources: Quinnipiac University Poll, June 2018; General polling aggregates, summer 2018 > There was no Collusion with Russia **UNVERIFIABLE** The Mueller investigation was ongoing at this date (July 2018). The final report (March 2019) found insufficient evidence of criminal conspiracy with Russia but documented extensive contacts. The categorical denial is premature at the time of posting. Sources: Mueller Report, March 2019 > The two FBI lovers were a fraud against our Nation **MOSTLY FALSE** The DOJ Inspector General report (released June 2018) found that Peter Strzok and Lisa Page exchanged anti-Trump texts but concluded their personal opinions did not demonstrably affect investigative decisions. The IG explicitly stated the investigation was opened on a proper predicate. 'Fraud against our Nation' is not supported by the IG's findings. Sources: DOJ OIG Report, June 2018 > The only Collusion was with the Dems **FALSE** No federal investigation or credible evidence established that Democratic Party officials colluded with Russia in the sense analogous to the allegations against the Trump campaign. The reference to the Steele dossier's partial DNC funding does not constitute 'collusion with Russia.' Sources: Mueller Report, March 2019; Senate Intelligence Committee Report, 2020 > Won lawsuit filed by the DNC (referenced in prior post) **MOSTLY TRUE** A federal judge did dismiss the DNC civil lawsuit against Trump campaign, Russia, and WikiLeaks in August 2018, citing lack of standing and failure to state a claim. The prior post's claim of winning predates the formal dismissal but the case was going poorly for the DNC by this point. Sources: DNC v. Russian Federation et al., SDNY, dismissed August 2018 Overall Veracity: 34% ## Tags - witch-hunt-branding (95%) - russia-collusion-denial (95%) - projection (90%) - DARVO (88%) - false-consensus (82%) - paranoid-features (78%) - mueller-investigation (95%) - FBI-delegitimization (85%) - epistemic-closure (80%) - repost-correction (60%) ## That day _From trump.fm's machine-generated digest of the day, not his words._ **Mueller Obsession Dominates as Triple Repost Reveals Unmetabolized Narcissistic Injury** Trump spent most of the day fixated on the Mueller investigation, posting essentially the same attack five times — including three nearly identical versions of one post, correcting typos each time while leaving his grievances intact. A brief, bland tease about his upcoming Supreme Court pick was the only break in an otherwise single-minded assault on the investigation, the FBI, and Democrats. The day ended with the most aggressive post yet, naming specific individuals with dehumanizing labels and rattling off debunked conspiracy theories. It was a day of grinding resentment, not eruption — a man unable to stop picking at the same wound. Full digest for 2018-07-07: https://trump.fm/date/2018-07-07/analysis ## Citation - APA: Trump, D. J. (2018, July 7). Public opinion has turned strongly against the... [Social media post]. X (Twitter). trump.fm. https://trump.fm/post/x_1015694335151656961 - MLA: Trump, Donald J. "Public opinion has turned strongly against the Rigged Witch..." X (Twitter), 7 Jul. 2018. trump.fm, https://trump.fm/post/x_1015694335151656961. Accessed 9 Oct. 2026. - Chicago: Donald J. Trump, "Public opinion has turned strongly against the Rigged Witch...," X (Twitter), July 7, 2018, archived at trump.fm, https://trump.fm/post/x_1015694335151656961. ## For agents - Site overview: https://trump.fm/llms.txt - API specification: https://trump.fm/openapi.json - MCP server: https://trump.fm/mcp (search and fetch tools, no auth) - This post as JSON: https://trump.fm/api/posts/x_1015694335151656961 - Analysis as JSON: https://trump.fm/api/analysis/x_1015694335151656961 - All citation formats: https://trump.fm/api/cite/x_1015694335151656961 - Same day: https://trump.fm/date/2018-07-07 - The record alone, without the analysis: https://trump.fm/post/x_1015694335151656961.md?analysis=false _Markdown view of a trump.fm page. Post, analysis, date, feed, contradictions, search and about pages answer in markdown at their URL with `.md` appended (`/index.md` for the home page), or when sent `Accept: text/markdown`._