# Post x_1275438930276409300

- Post ID: `x_1275438930276409300`
- Platform: X (Twitter)
- Posted: 2020-06-23T18:41:52.000Z (UTC)
- Deleted: no
- Repost: no
- Canonical URL: https://trump.fm/post/x_1275438930276409300
- Analysis page: https://trump.fm/post/x_1275438930276409300/analysis
- Audio narration: https://static.trump.fm/audio/x_1275438930276409300.mp3 (a synthesized voice reading the post text, not a recording)

## Post text

> ....Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is with us in all ways, a very high 72% Approval Rating. So, if he is in charge along with V.P. etc., and with us doing all of these really good things, why doesn’t the Lamestream Media treat us as they should? Answer: Because they are Fake News!

## Engagement

- Likes: 0
- Reposts: 15,295
- Replies: 0
- Views: unknown
- Metrics collected: 2026-02-01T01:33:24.822Z (UTC)

# Analysis

_Machine-generated by trump.fm on 2026-03-19T08:40:45.829Z (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 June 23, 2020 post exemplifies Trump's characteristic vulnerable narcissistic state under multi-threat pressure. Simultaneously facing the Tulsa rally humiliation, COVID surge, DACA defeat, and Bolton revelations, the post constructs a defensive counter-narrative anchored to Fauci's 72% approval — borrowed as credibility rather than genuine endorsement. The central rhetorical move is an appeal by association: co-opt an approved figure's popularity to claim administrative validation, then weaponize the gap between that approval and actual media coverage as evidence of bias. Defense mechanisms include rationalization (Fauci's popularity as proof of success), displacement (grievance redirected from failures to media), denial (framing a surging pandemic as "really good things"), and splitting (binary good-us/bad-media world). The "Fake News" terminus functions as epistemic closure — preemptively discrediting any coverage contradicting the self-assessment. Stylistically authentic Trump despite business-hours timing. No violent imagery, dehumanizing language, or stochastic terrorism indicators. Cognitive markers are absent; the logical non-sequitur is baseline-consistent. This post does not represent significant deviation from established patterns — it is one data point in a persistent paranoid-narcissistic grievance reflex that intensifies reliably under external threat.

## Analytical Commentary: June 23, 2020 — Fauci Approval / Fake News Grievance

### Authorship Attribution

**Local time:** The UTC stamp of 18:41:52 converts to **2:41 PM EDT** at the White House. This falls squarely within business hours, which is a Scavino-associated window. However, several strong stylistic markers push against aide authorship:

- The leading ellipsis ("....") is a direct continuation of the prior tweet ending "But they do give...." — an unpolished thread-continuation device Trump uses personally
- "Lamestream Media" is an idiosyncratic Trump neologism absent from aide-written communications
- The rhetorical question-then-self-answer format ("why doesn't... Answer: Because they are Fake News!") is a signature Trump oral transcription pattern
- The logical non-sequitur — Fauci's approval rating as grounds for media grievance — reflects the associative, not-quite-following chain typical of authentic Trump posts
- Capitalization ("Lamestream," "Fake News," "V.P.") follows his personal conventions

**Assessment:** Likely **authentic Trump**, possibly with light aide cleanup. The business-hours timing moderates confidence slightly.

---

### Psychological State and Triggers

This post arrives amid an extraordinary cluster of simultaneous stressors on June 23, 2020:

- COVID-19 cases surging toward record highs (26 states trending upward)
- Tulsa rally humiliation — 6,200 attendees vs. near-1M claimed ticket requests
- Supreme Court DACA defeat (5-4)
- Bolton book publication revealing damaging details
- Geoffrey Berman firing generating negative coverage
- Noose/Bubba Wallace story dominating news cycle

The post represents a **consolidation defense** under pressure: rather than address any specific failure, Trump constructs a unifying counter-narrative ("we did all these good things") anchored to the one positive data point available — Fauci's 72% approval rating — and deploys it as leverage for a media grievance.

**Trigger type:** Primarily **narcissistic injury** from accumulated bad press compounded by the Tulsa humiliation. The post is a reactive grievance, not supply-seeking or preemptive.

**Narcissistic state:** **Vulnerable** — the post betrays persecution preoccupation rather than expansive grandiosity. The grandiosity is present but subordinated to victimhood ("why doesn't the Lamestream Media treat us as they should?").

---

### Defense Mechanisms

1. **Rationalization (neurotic):** Fauci's 72% approval is co-opted as evidence that the administration's COVID response is validated, which then becomes grounds for demanding positive media coverage. The logical chain does not hold — Fauci's popularity was often *contrasted* with Trump's COVID handling — but it functions as a self-serving justification.

2. **Displacement (neurotic):** Genuine failures (COVID surge, Tulsa debacle, DACA loss) are not addressed. Instead, grievance is redirected to the media as the proximate cause of all negative perception.

3. **Denial (pathological):** The framing of "doing all of these really good things" in the context of record COVID case surges represents a refusal to engage with objective external reality. US was entering a second wave. The positivity is not delusional in the clinical sense but is a deliberate denial of countervailing evidence.

4. **Splitting (immature):** The world is cleanly divided: the administration (with Fauci, V.P., doing "good things") vs. the Lamestream Media (Fake News). No middle ground acknowledged.

---

### Rhetorical Analysis

- **Appeal to authority by association:** Fauci's 72% approval is invoked not to credit Fauci, but to borrow his credibility and transfer it to the administration. This is a rhetorical sleight of hand — Fauci's approval at this period was *despite*, not *because of*, administration COVID messaging.
- **False equivalence:** High public approval of Fauci ≠ media should positively cover Trump's COVID record. The syllogism is constructed to seem logical while containing a category error.
- **Ad hominem reductio:** "Lamestream Media" reduces the entire press corps to a dismissible caricature, short-circuiting engagement with specific criticisms.
- **Rhetorical question/self-answer:** The "Answer: Because they are Fake News!" structure performs the debate he is avoiding having — Trump asks the question and provides the answer, leaving no space for legitimate inquiry.
- **Superlatives:** "really good things" (vague, self-referential positive claim)

**No violent imagery, no dehumanizing language, no stochastic terrorism indicators** in this post.

---

### Narrative Identity

- **Protagonist role:** Competent, besieged executive — doing the right things, surrounded by competent people (Fauci, V.P.), unjustly denied recognition
- **Narrative sequence:** **Contamination** — the good work is poisoned by media betrayal/refusal to acknowledge it
- **Identity claims:** Competent COVID responder; leader of a unified team; victim of systematic press bias
- **Contrasting other:** "Lamestream Media" / "Fake News" — the corrupt institutional force denying reality

---

### Gaslighting and Reality Distortion

Mild gaslighting is present. The post asserts the administration's COVID record should generate positive coverage at the precise moment cases were surging toward record highs. This is not confabulation (cognitive error) but deliberate framing — the reader is invited to accept a reality contradicted by the daily case count. The "Fake News" label is deployed to preemptively discredit any reporting that contradicts the self-assessment.

**Epistemic closure:** Classic. In-group is defined by acceptance that media criticism = fake; out-group is defined by believing the critical coverage.

---

### Fact Verification

| Claim | Verdict | Evidence |
|-------|---------|----------|
| "Dr. Fauci has a 'very high 72% Approval Rating'" | **Mostly True** | Multiple polls in spring-summer 2020 showed Fauci with approval ratings in the 65-80% range. A June 2020 CNN poll showed 67% approval; other outlets recorded up to 80%. The 72% figure is within the range of contemporaneous polling. |
| "Administration is 'doing all of these really good things' on COVID" | **Mostly False** | As of June 23, 2020, the US had exceeded 2.4 million total cases and 124,000+ deaths, with 26 states showing upward trends and a new second wave beginning. Record daily case counts were being set. While ventilator production and testing volume were genuine achievements, the overall pandemic outcome was among the worst in the developed world on a per-capita basis. |
| "Media refuses to acknowledge COVID accomplishments" | **Half True** | Major outlets did cover ventilator production and testing milestones positively. However, concurrent coverage of surging cases, high death tolls, and Tulsa rally COVID failures was also factually grounded. The characterization that *no* positive coverage occurred is inaccurate; that critical coverage dominated reflects the objective news environment. |

Overall Veracity: 50%

## Authorship Analysis

**Self-Written** (score: 72%)

### Indicators

- Leading ellipsis '....' is a direct continuation of previous thread post ending 'But they do give....'
- 'Lamestream Media' is an idiosyncratic Trump neologism not used by aides
- Rhetorical question-then-self-answer format ('Answer: Because they are Fake News!') mirrors Trump's oral transcription style
- Logical non-sequitur (Fauci approval → media should cover us better) reflects authentic associative reasoning
- Capitalization conventions ('Lamestream,' 'Fake News,' 'V.P.') consistent with personal Trump posting

## Psychological Profile

### State

**Vulnerable State**

**Trigger:** Narcissistic Injury — Criticism (Accumulated bad press from Tulsa rally failure, COVID surge, DACA defeat, Bolton book, Berman firing)

**Rage:** Intensity 38% targeting Mainstream media / 'Lamestream Media'
- Proportionality: 25%

Sentiment: -0.32

### Clinical

**Malignant Narcissism:**
- Narcissistic: 62%
- Antisocial: 20%
- Paranoid: 55%
- Sadism: 8%

**Defense Mechanisms:**
- rationalization (neurotic)
- displacement (neurotic)
- denial (pathological)
- splitting (immature)

**Cognitive Complexity:**
- Complexity: 28%

**Parasocial Techniques:**
- Rhetorical question addressed directly to follower base ('why doesn't the Lamestream Media treat us as they should?')
- Self-answer format that performs debate on behalf of followers, pre-supplying grievance validation
- Inclusive 'we' and 'us' framing that absorbs followers into the aggrieved collective

## Danger Assessment

**NONE**

### Gaslighting

- Asserting COVID response deserves positive coverage precisely as cases surge to record highs — inviting followers to accept a reality contradicted by simultaneous news
- 'Fake News' label deployed preemptively to discredit any coverage contradicting the self-assessment, before specific criticisms are engaged
- Fauci's approval co-opted as administration validation when contemporaneous polling explicitly contrasted Fauci favorability with Trump COVID disapproval

## Fact Checks (3)

_The model's verdicts from 2026-03-19._

> Dr. Fauci has a 'very high 72% Approval Rating'

**MOSTLY TRUE**

Multiple polls in spring-summer 2020 showed Fauci with approval ratings in the 65-80% range. A June 2020 CNN poll showed 67% approval; other outlets recorded up to 80%. The 72% figure is within the range of contemporaneous polling.

Sources: Contemporary polling aggregates from CNN, Quinnipiac, and Axios/Ipsos (June 2020)

> Administration is 'doing all of these really good things' on COVID

**MOSTLY FALSE**

As of June 23, 2020, the US had exceeded 2.4 million total cases and 124,000+ deaths, with 26 states showing upward trends and a new second wave beginning. Record daily case counts were being set. While ventilator production and testing volume were genuine achievements, the overall pandemic outcome was among the worst in the developed world on a per-capita basis.

Sources: Known events context: COVID-19 Second Wave Surge Begins in US

> Media refuses to acknowledge COVID accomplishments

**HALF TRUE**

Major outlets did cover ventilator production and testing milestones positively. However, concurrent coverage of surging cases, high death tolls, and Tulsa rally COVID failures was also factually grounded. The characterization that *no* positive coverage occurred is inaccurate; that critical coverage dominated reflects the objective news environment.

Sources: General knowledge of contemporaneous media coverage

Overall Veracity: 50%

## Tags

- narcissistic-grievance (85%)
- media-persecution (82%)
- vulnerable-narcissism (75%)
- displacement (78%)
- rationalization (72%)
- fake-news (90%)
- appeal-by-association (80%)
- epistemic-closure (85%)
- fauci-co-optation (70%)
- covid-reality-distortion (75%)
- authentic-trump-style (72%)
- contamination-narrative (68%)
- multi-threat-pressure (80%)

## That day

_From trump.fm's machine-generated digest of the day, not his words._

**Siege Mentality: Bolton Book, COVID Surge, and Tulsa Fallout Converge in a 21-Hour Multi-Front Defensive Barrage**

Trump spent the day in a sustained defensive posture, fighting on multiple fronts after one of his worst weeks in office. He attacked John Bolton repeatedly with escalating fury over the former adviser's newly published memoir, while issuing threats of force and imprisonment against protesters who had tried to topple an Andrew Jackson statue near the White House. He recycled the debunked claim that rising COVID cases were merely a testing artifact, and defended the poorly attended Tulsa rally by pivoting to TV ratings. Late-night and pre-dawn posting — with activity stretching past 4:30 AM — pointed to significant sleep disruption and emotional agitation throughout.

Full digest for 2020-06-23: https://trump.fm/date/2020-06-23/analysis

## Citation

- APA: Trump, D. J. (2020, June 23). ....Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is with us in all... [Social media post]. X (Twitter). trump.fm. https://trump.fm/post/x_1275438930276409300
- MLA: Trump, Donald J. "....Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is with us in all ways, a very..." X (Twitter), 23 Jun. 2020. trump.fm, https://trump.fm/post/x_1275438930276409300. Accessed 9 Oct. 2026.
- Chicago: Donald J. Trump, "....Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is with us in all ways, a very...," X (Twitter), June 23, 2020, archived at trump.fm, https://trump.fm/post/x_1275438930276409300.

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