For my second media response, I chose to analyze Donald Trump’s Presidential speeches. Donald Trump is currently campaigning for the American 2016 President election in the United States. His first campaign as President was in the year of 2000, with two victories of Reform Party primaries (Wikipedia). Trump became well-known for his hatred towards illegal immigration and free trade agreements, in addition, to his free trade view on foreign policies. (Wikipedia). Trump owns his own company called The Trump Organization, he is the President and the Chairman of his companies (Wikipedia).
He is also the founder of the gaming and hotel enterprise of the Trump Entertainment Resorts, but it is now owned by Carl Icahn (Wikipedia). During Trump’s speeches, it demonstrates many key concepts of cultural studies. Throughout the speeches Donald Trump speaks about the concepts of stereotypes, citizenship, racism, and class mobility. Stereotype is defined as “a form of representation that reduces people to a few simple, essential characteristics that are represented as a fixed by nature” (O’Brien et. al 181).
During Trump’s presidential speech on June 16th, 2015, he states that “when was the last time you saw a Chevrolet in Tokyo; doesn’t exist folks” (YouTube). He is assuming that there are no Chevrolet car brands in Tokyo, that all they use is their own type of brand such as Toyota. Trump stereotypes Mexicans as people that have lot of problems while “bringing [their] problems [to the United States]” (YouTube) when they exchange raw materials. In addition, he stereotypes them as people with crimes; “they’re bring drugs, they’re bring crimes, they’re rapists” (YouTube).
This statement made from Trump had brought a numerous amount of attention, including Hispanic groups and the Mexican government (Deggans). Trump stated that the United States does not have any more victories in trade deals. Also, he states that the United States had “become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problem” (YouTube). After the speech was made public, it caused many controversies, such as the network NBC, which ended all its business relations with Trump (Deggans). As a result, this includes that “NBC will no longer air Miss USA or Miss Universe beauty pageants,” which Trump co-owns (Deggans).
Personally, I believe that Trump meat to offend all the Mexicans in that way, he just strongly opposes the illegal immigrants that crossed the United States border. The definition of citizenship is “the position or status of being a citizen of a particular country” (Oxford Dictionary). During Trump’s speech on January 29th, 2016, he argues that Ted Cruz ineligible to run for President of United States since he is also a citizen of Canada. Ted Cruz is also running a campaign for President of America. However, Donald Trump does not like the “fact that he was born in Canada and he has had a double passport” (Epps).
Donald trump believes that to be able to run for president of United States, an individual must be a natural-born citizen of America (Epps). Trump’s hatred on Ted Cruz threatens to sue him for not being a natural-born citizen of America, and also for all the negative ads about Donald Trump (Scout). In my opinion, Trump feels insecure about where he stands against Ted Cruz, which is why he persuades American citizens that Ted Cruz should not be able to run for President of United States. Since all the previous presidents were all born and raised in America.
Racism is defined as “the systematic practice of stereotyping and persuading people on the basis of their race” (O’Brien et al 86). Racism today, still continues as a central form of ideology. Ideology “refers to the process by which the set of values and beliefs that bind individualism together in a society become ‘naturalized’” (O’Brien et. al 41). In addition, cultural studies had focused on the ways of racist attitudes and stereotypes can both be emphasized by and challenged in many different popular cultural practices (O’Brien et. al 222). On December 7th, 2015 Trump gave a speech about banning Muslims from entering the United States.
He called for a “total shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until out country’s representatives can figure out what is going on” (Diamond). Including the Muslim-Americans that had been on vacation that wants to return to their home in the United States. This situation was caused by the deadly shootings in San Bernardino, California, by a suspected ISIS sympathizer (Diamond). Trump’s comments were likely to upset the Republican presidential race, while forcing a lot of his opponents to engage in a debate over whether or not there should be a religious test in order to enter the United States (Diamond).
Trump states that America “cannot be the victim of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad” (Diamond). With that being said, Trump is just being racist towards people that believe in Jihad. He is assuming that all people that believe in Jihad are people with a criminal sense of mind. After his speech about banning Muslims from entering the United States, he received “great hatred towards American by large segments of Muslim populations” (Diamond).
Class mobility refers to as “a characteristic of societies in which it is possible for an individual or a family to move from one social class to another and thus alter their social status and economic standing” (O’Brien et. al 14). Donald Trump is well-known for is strong opposition of illegal immigration to the United States. He is strongly against immigrants of the working class stealing all the jobs and wages in America, leaving no opportunities for American citizens. (Sandel). Trump complains that America never wins anymore against China during his speech on June 16th, 2015.
His campaign is about reversing American’s disempowerment. (Sandel). This is one of the reasons why Donald Trump has so many working-class men supporter “who feel the economy and the culture have left them behind” (Sandel). He also gains many supports by promising to “expand health care, enact trade protectionism, fix the nation’s infrastructure, and improve the lives of the working class (Devega). Donald Trump become well-known due to his strong hatred towards illegal immigrations and free trade agreements. He is running campaigns for the American 2016 President election.
In addition, Trump previously ran his first campaign as president in the year 2000 and had won 2 victories of Reform Party Primaries. First, in his speech on June 16th, 2015 he stereotypes that all Mexicans are people that hold crimes of being rapist which causes many controversies including the Hispanic groups and the Mexican government. Secondly, Trump’s hatred towards Ted Cruz because he has the title of being a citizen of Canada and the United States. Trump believes that to be eligible to be President of America is that one must be born and raised in the United States.
Thirdly, Trump bans all Muslims from entering America due to some situations of confusion because of the deadly shootings in San Bernardino, California. He automatically assumes that it was the Muslims fault and takes away all their rights and freedom to enter America. Finally, Trump has many working-class supporter because he promises that he will improve the lives of the working class including the expansion of health care. Therefore, in Donald Trump’s presidential speeches shows many key concepts of cultural studies, such as stereotypes, citizenship, racism, and class mobility.
