The branded enemy. How Trump turns people into labels

In early July, a journalist asked Donald Trump a question about political responsibility for the recent flooding in Florida. Trump did not respond with facts or policy—he responded with a slur. The reporter, he said, was “a disgusting human being.” Two days later, members of his own coalition criticized potential ties to Jeffrey Epstein. Trump’s response on Truth Social: “These are very bad people. Sick, deranged and evil.” No rebuttal, no explanation—just moral condemnation.

These episodes follow a clear pattern: Trump doesn’t treat critics as political opponents but as evil people. The conflict is no longer about facts or positions—it becomes a moral disqualification. Those who question, who doubt, who contradict him, are branded as “the enemy of the people”—a phrase Trump has repeatedly used against the media since 2017. Back then, he tweeted: “The FAKE NEWS media […] is the enemy of the American People.”

This rhetoric follows a calculated strategy: Trump assigns people labels that function like brands—concise, repeatable, and destructive. “Deranged Jack Smith,” “Crooked Joe,” “Sleepy Joe,” “Disgusting Ron DeSanctimonious”—such nicknames create identity through simplification. They stick—and erase complexity.

This kind of moral branding follows the logic of brand creation: it reduces complexity, creates recognizability, stirs emotion—and turns people into marked enemy figures whose identity becomes condensed into a single, dehumanizing label.

What began in 2016 with “Crooked Hillary” became a systematic approach. The media were branded as “the enemy of the people.” Dissent within his own party was redefined as treason: “What they have done is treason,” Trump said in May 2020 about members of the Obama administration. He responded to the Capitol investigation in 2022 by stating: “These people are evil, sick, and deranged lunatics.” The formula remains unchanged: criticism is not legitimate—it is evil.

The technique of not just discrediting political opponents but morally dehumanizing them has a troubling history. Under National Socialism, people were branded as “subhuman.” In Stalin’s Soviet Union, they were eliminated as “enemies of the people.” In Rwanda, Tutsis were referred to as “cockroaches” for years—with genocidal consequences. Even in 1950s America, the McCarthy era allowed for no legitimate opposition—only “un-American activities.” The pattern is always the same: criticism becomes betrayal, people become threats, and words become weapons.

Trump’s rhetoric does not stand outside this history—it updates it through the logic of marketing. The political phenomenon of Trump is, in many ways, a case study in brand construction. He deliberately applies methods and techniques from the world of advertising: simplification, repetition, emotionalization, polarization. It recalls the historical overlap between propaganda and advertising—not just in language but in origin. Both emerged in the same era. Both rely on the same tools. Political propaganda and commercial marketing are closely related—and Trump knows it. He is less a politician than a brand strategist, less an arguer than an architect of attention.

This kind of moral escalation has dangerous consequences. It emotionalizes the public sphere, mobiles resentment, and replaces political debate with contempt. Once a person has been branded as evil, they are no longer heard—they are fought. No longer refuted—but dehumanized.

The language with which Trump turns his opponents into enemies is not a rhetorical quirk. It is a means of domination. It shifts the boundaries of what can be said—and thus of what can be thought, and ultimately, of what can be done. Those labeled as “evil” forfeit their claim to protection. And that is the danger.