Chaos, trauma, acceptance…don’t repeat!

With Monday night’s Jan. 6 prison pardon monstrosity, Trump’s setting us up to normalize ongoing trauma. Take it from me: don’t let him!

The Resistant Grandmother (TRG) has not written a column since Donald Trump’s election. Given that, a special thank you to all my subscribers for sticking with me. Inexplicably, somehow I even gained a few more over the last few months in spite of no new posts.

In recovery
I stopped writing because the election was just too painful to deal with. The American people chose a convicted felon, serial misogynist who has caused irreparable harm and taken away reproductive freedom for millions of American women, causing death in the process. He staged an insurrection in 2020 to stay in the White House and constructed a fabric of lies around a “corrupt election process” that magically did not affect this year’s contest, since he won.

He stole national secrets and would not return them to the people who own them: us! He’s been convicted of election fraud running up to 2016 contest—found by a jury of his peers to be guilty on 34 felony counts. He lost to Kamala Harris dramatically in the election’s only debate between the two contestants. Convicted of business fraud, his history of personal and family grifting from his time in the White House continues with now bitcoin pathways for foreign leaders to line his pockets.

My thinking: this wouldn’t—couldn’t—happen, again. The American people were too fundamentally decent. Women voted more than men, and this would probably be no exception due to decades of data. Voters would surely remember his willful ignorance and mismanagement of Covid; his lackluster jobs creation and economic record. He didn’t lift a finger to make things better, basking in Obama’s economy with no new ideas of his own. Surely, they’d be on to him this time.

An optimist’s graveyard
All wrong. The close but decisive election results convinced me I had failed to read the tea leaves. I hadn’t sufficiently factored in the changing habits of the American people, especially those new voters 18-25 who’ve turned away from news entirely to rely on social media for their “information,” or the unreliable BS that passes for it these days. I didn’t count on men showing up in force, unlike past elections and 2020, when men failed to vote in sufficient quantities to offset women.

I didn’t count on the power of the price of eggs at the ballot box, something presidents don’t have any control over, especially during a pandemic of bird flu that cut down production of the breakfast staple and, so, under supply and demand economics, boosted their prices. (By the way, the origin story behind the rise of egg prices was rarely, if ever covered by the mainstream media, helping Trump.)

I couldn’t imagine voters pooh-poohing news of Trump’s business fraud, stealing national secrets, and his 34-count conviction for 2016 election fraud by paying off a porn star. Having overlooked or misjudged so much, who was I now to write about politics when I’d been so wrong about how the election would play out? Although correct about the man, I failed miserably in anticipating how unlike-minded voters would make their decisions. Maybe I should just hang up my laptop and call it a day.

Enjoying every benefit of our system, the insurrectionists trash it, as is their style
But an interview I saw last night on The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell woke me up from my self-imposed self-flagellation and conflict avoidance. O’Donnell interviewed Jackson Reffit, the son of insurrectionist Guy Reffit, now just released from a seven year prison sentence for his crimes against America on Jan. 6.

“…hitting her head on every step on her way down”
Guy Reffit’s conviction by a jury of his peers, in a courtroom and a system designed to afford him every resource to defend himself, was fairly adjudicated. The case proved that Reffit, a member of the Texas group called the Three Percenters, an anti-government militia, stormed the Capitol wearing body armor, packing a loaded Smith and Wesson pistol, and employing a video camera that recorded him saying, “We will take the Capitol before the day is over!” while carrying a cluster of zip ties.

One can only assume the ties would make good on his intention to kidnap then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and “drag her by the ankles, with her head hitting every step on her way down.”

Paying the price for doing the right thing
Jackson, who has described his father Guy as often moody, angry, and abusive, had contacted the FBI two weeks before the riot warning them of his father’s intentions, but the agency did not respond to the alarm. When his father returned to their Texas home after the riots, Jackson videoed the elder Reffit bragging about his involvement. Inexplicably, perhaps because he was proud, Guy Reffit agreed to the taping, but then warned his 18-year-old son and 16-year-old daughter ominously, “If you turn me in, you’re a traitor. And traitors get shot.”

Jackson shared the video confession with the FBI who then arrested Guy Reffit on Jan. 16. Among other witnesses, the younger Reffit testified at his father’s trial. Jurors then voted his father guilty on: five obstruction charges, entering and remaining on restricted grounds, and obstruction of justice because Reffit and the other rioters caused the Electoral counting to be postponed. Showing no remorse, Reffit did not enjoy a lighter sentence. And while in prison a confidence in his criminality came through in his prison manifesto. In it, Reffit referred to himself and the other rioters as “patriots rebelling against an unjust U.S. government,” and continued to sing Trump’s praises as other incarcerants did.

No justice for Jackson and justice itself
And so on inauguration night, stiffing the government he leads and its system of justice he took an oath that very afternon to protect, Trump nonetheless released all the insurrectionists. Now that Reffit has been welcomed back home by his wife and daughter, his son Jackson believes his father and/or other insurrectionists will track him down and kill him. Reffit, armed again and dangerous, poses a material threat to his son. As Jackson said last night on Lawrence O’Donnell from his secluded location:

“I can’t imagine what he’s going to be willing to do now. It could get a whole lot worse.”

Trump’s pardon upended any sense of security Jackson had been able to feel during the lockup period. Now, detached from his family and mindful that not just his father but other rioters may be looking for him, he’s facing great danger while being virtually alone in the world.

Thanks to Trump, it was all for nought
You could look at Trump’s impulsive and sweeping pardons as a kind of end-of-the-legal system in this country. The nation's chief executive has mocked its essence, prioritizing lawbreaking over upholding the law and by doing so has told the scores of FBI agents, prosecutors, judges, juries, witnesses, and court personnel that the most comprehensive prosecution in the nation’s history was all for nought.

Militia groups may well use this as a recruiting tool –”Join up! The President protects us!” And Trump now has regained the thousands he recruited in 2020 to remain in “stand back and stand by” mode. This cannot help but inspire fear in any and all trial witnesses, judicial employees and their familIes that they too may fear for their lives.

My story
Watching Jackson’s Tuesday night O’Donnell interview not only kindled deep concern for the young man whose bravery helped incarcerate, however briefly, a dangerous criminal. It also brought back memories of my own years living in fear of an abusive family member. Watching Jackson, the horror of that memory rushed forward. It reemerged from a time when I too believed “the system” had failed to protect me from possible, if not imminent, harm.

My brother, six years older than I, grew up with a series of problems not routinely treated in 1950s and early ‘60s America: learning disorders, parent issues, deep-seated personal insecurities, and distrust in and hatred for anyone and everyone whom he perceived to be against him, which admittedly was probably a fairly large group.

That rage erupted to the point where one day, when I was around 14, he threatened to kill me. My unwise parents had given him a rifle as a last-minute Christmas present, no less, to placate his anger; it wasn't under the tree as he expected. A few months later, in an angry fugue, he brandished the gun around the house threatening to kill us. I hid in a closet, worrying about my mother who was not there with me. Instead she was pleading with my brother to put the gun away. And at great danger to herself, managed to “talk him down.”

Saving America from what I endured
I survived. But that incident, and the belief there was no one there to take charge and save us left lasting emotional scars that have maimed my sense of security to this day. Through therapy, I’ve learned to understand what happened and why. In lamenting my lack of a normal early life to the therapist, the one who would get through and make a difference, he responded with bracing clarity: “No, you didn’t get that. So now what? What’s next?” From then on, I took my life into my own hands. But vestiges of PTSD linger on, now visiting me again beginning with Monday night’s prisoner release. As with other truma victims, the more chaos Trump causes, the more often we may relive the trauma of past events. I don’t want this to become the default pattern for America’s daily life.

Trump family values: trauma, chaos, betrayal
As bad as my story is, it’s not all that unlike the hideous hidden secrets of other dysfunctional families. The household that created the person who is Donald Trump is a case in point.

Trump’s niece Mary, the daughter of Donald’s older brother Fred, has written about Donald Trump’s origins in two books, the first being,“Too Much and Never Enough.” Written in 2017, her first book chronicles Trump’s early years and his toxic relationship with the rest of the family, especially with her father, Trump’s older brother Fred. The two oldest brothers, younger brother, and two sisters grew up in a family ruled by the iron fist of Trump patriarch Fred Trump, Sr.—a cruel taskmaster with Mary’s father Fred Jr. taking the brunt of the abuse. His crime: not wanting to take over his father’s real estate business. His refusal subjected Fred, Jr. to abuse and retaliation. Younger brother Donald replaced Fred in his father’s affections and the older Trump son turned to alcohol. This ruined a burgeoning career in aviation and led to an early death.

Focusing on Trump-caused national trauma
Her most recent book, The Reckoning, reveals the toll dysfunction has taken on her, personally. A clinical psychologist, Ms. Trump has long been in therapy for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), a malady I share based on my own experiences. By Mary Trump’s description, the difference between the 2017 and 2024 books is that Trump’s niece is no longer just writing about her own trauma. Book Two focuses on the “entire nation’s trauma” as a result of Trump’s first presidency and his plans to run for a second term.

She said: “We need to sort through the repressed anxiety of Donald Trump’s influence on the American people as a whole.” It must be “sorted through” if democracy is to survive” — a clarion call made even more relevant with Donald Trump’s winning a second term.

In just two short days, we’ve already seen how Trump’s ongoing chaos ends up causing trauma. Expanding on the ways he caused continuous upheaval in his first term, Trump 2.0 appears to be off to an even faster start. If we’re not careful to reclaim ourselves and our nation, trauma could become an expected everyday occurrence in an undemocratic, lawless future—-the kind Trump seems bent on imposing on the U.S.

When faced with the task of overcoming the pain and exhaustion he’ll likely be meting out in unrestrained fashion, we might best learn the lessons of trauma victims down through history who have chosen recovery over recidivism. It begins with a clear and decisive answer to the question centered around what we’re going to do about it: “What’s next?”

—trg

Who I write for…

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