From f-bombs to hogtied opponents, Trump has transformed politics.

“WASHINGTON,” the In June of 2004, former Vice President Dick Cheney had just finished posing for the annual Senate class photo when he said the notorious “f-bomb” at Senator Patrick Leahy, who was serving at the time. It was newsworthy on a national scale.

According to Leahy, Cheney’s connections to Halliburton, an energy services business that was successful in securing lucrative contracts related to the Iraq war, were a source of criticism. Following the conversation that took place between Leahy and Cheney on the Senate floor on that particular day, Cheney concluded their conversation by saying, “Go f— yourself.”

According to Kevin Kellems, who served as Cheney’s press secretary in the past, “It seems like yesterday, but in reality, it’s a relic, a vignette by comparison to today’s – what I guess I would call – daily gusher of vitriol and vulgarity.” Although it was somewhat unremarkable in comparison, it did garner a great deal of attention.
However, the use of harsh rhetoric and expletives in politics, which were once regarded to be shameful to employ in public, has now become the norm among lawmakers and political candidates.

This dynamic has been influenced by a number of variables, according to experts that USA TODAY spoke with. These elements include the growing polarization between the two parties, the rise of social media, and the desire to appeal to day-to-day voters. And they specifically credited one individual with bringing profanity into the mainstream, and that individual was former President Donald Trump.

Since the beginning of his campaign for the presidency in 2016, Donald Trump has made frequent use of profanity, which has the effect of altering the conventional rules for political discourse in many different ways. One of his most recent stunts consisted of releasing a video that showed Vice President Joe Biden being bound and hogtied to the back of a pickup truck. However, the evidence demonstrates that his impact has not been limited to his own party alone.

The number of f-bombs that congressional politicians have used on X, which was formerly known as Twitter, has climbed from 0 in 2015 to 205 in 2023, according to an analysis that was carried out by Quorum, a software platform that specializes in public affairs. In the year 2015, lawmakers on X used the phrase “hell” 79 times, and by the year 2023, that number had climbed to 1095 times.
Melissa Baese-Berk, an associate professor of linguistics at the University of Chicago, stated that “Language is always changing,” which includes the notion of what is and is not considered to be acceptable.

Growing movement towards profanity

According to Lindsay Chervinsky, a historian, even though parliamentarians have always been known to curse in private, there was a certain amount of decorum that they were required to preserve in public. This was especially true during the 20th century, when politics came to be considered as a profession. It is for this reason that politicians use profanity in their speeches and interviews very infrequently.

During his time working as an assistant for Indiana Senator Richard Lugar from 1988 until 1996, Kellems stated that he is unable to recall a “single, mildly offending term” that the lawmaker used during that time period.

The political polarization in the country, however, worsened during the 1990s and 2000s in the midst of worldwide wars and other difficulties, according to experts. This caused the situation to take a turn for the worst. At the same time that more people in the United States started experimenting with flamboyant language, there was also a growing cultural acceptability of profanity and slang languages.

“That does not mean that politicians started swearing in public in front of the electorate,” said Michael Adams, an English professor at Indiana University Bloomington. “That is not the case.” “But that’s the kind of the background where you can see how things have loosened up enough.”

When discussing the manner in which former President George W. Bush handled the Iraq war, then-Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts used the f-bomb in an interview with Rolling Stone in the year 2004. Andrew Card, Secretary of the Bush administration, expressed his dissatisfaction with Kerry’s use of those language.

Ye, the musician who was formerly known as Kanye West, was reportedly referred to as a “jackass” by President Barack Obama for interrupting Taylor Swift’s speech at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2009.
For example, in 2010, after the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, then-Vice President Joe Biden muttered into President Barack Obama’s ear, “This is a big f—ing deal.” This was one of the many instances in which hot mic situations grew more prevalent. There was also a recording of him calling Peter Doocy, a reporter for Fox News, a “stupid son of a b—-” during an event that took place in 2022. Following that, Biden called Doocy and expressed his regret.

And then there’s Trump

Trump, on the other hand, altered the dynamic in terms of the vocabulary that is considered appropriate for politicians, according to analysts. According to Jennifer Mercieca, an expert in political communication, he specifically ran against “political correctness” in 2016 and brought the use of profanity into the mainstream.

The National Football League players who kneeled during the playing of the national anthem were referred to as “sons of bi—, ” by President Trump in 2017. At least one senator who was present at the conference reported that he referred to Haiti and other African nations as “shithole countries” in the year 2018. This information comes from numerous news organizations. It was not uncommon for him to use phrases such as “hell,” “damn,” and “crap” whether he was speaking in formal circumstances or at rallies.

During her time working on Trump’s first presidential campaign and then as his press secretary in the White House, Stephanie Grisham stated that part of his vocabulary appealed to people because they thought that he spoke in a manner that was similar to their own.
My first encounter with him was when he uttered the word “sh–.” When I first heard that, I said to myself, “Okay, that’s awesome, because now it’s not just this boring, stodgy old Republican way.” The way she described it was “kind of like this new and fresh way to get people’s attention.” “I was thinking to myself, this guy seems to be normal.”

On the other hand, his use of vulgarity would provoke his supporters in a negative manner. The slogan “Trump that B——” was printed on one of the most popular campaign t-shirts that supporters of Donald Trump wore in 2016, and it was directed at Hillary Clinton. Karrin Anderson, a professor of communication studies at Colorado State University, stated that slurs such as “b—-” are a reflection of and a reinforcement of the societal antipathy that exists toward women in political leadership positions.

It has been stated by Grisham that Trump’s vocabulary has become increasingly incendiary over the course of time, progressing from the use of profanity to statements such as immigration “poisoning the blood of the country.” According to the expertise of the specialists, he has most certainly encouraged politicians in Congress to use that rhetoric as well. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, referred to Rep. Lauren Boebert, a Republican from Colorado, as a “little b—-” yesterday on the House floor.

An investigation conducted by Quorum, on the other hand, discovered that Democrats used more vulgarity than Republicans on X in 2023, including retweets. On the other hand, Republicans used the word “hell” 472 times and the word “sh–” 161 times, while Democrats used the word “sh–” on 161 occasions.
“As social media platforms like Facebook and X have become increasingly integrated with political culture, legislators have grown more adept at leveraging these channels to connect directly with their constituents and communicate in a more genuine, unfiltered manner,” according to Erin Mills, the chief marketing officer at Quorum. As a former member of the United States National Commission for UNESCO and an intern in the office of the Chief of Staff during the Obama administration, Alex Wirth, who is now the co-founder of the organization, had previously worked for the Obama administration.

However, other senators who were interviewed by USA TODAY stated that they were unable to comment on the specific Quorum statistics. However, they did link an increase in profanity overall to an increase of rage in national politics.

Rep. Jamaal Bowman, a Democrat from New York, stated that “perhaps people are just more pissed off.” “I mean, we just had an uprising a couple of years ago…when you have white nationalists trying to destroy the government, people are going to drop the f-bomb every once in a while,” the speaker said.

What this means for the nature of politics

Mark Smith, a professor of political science at Cedarville University, anticipates that there will be an increase in “attacks, threats, and heated language” in the general election that will take place in 2024.

We have moved quite far past a funny response, such as Ronald Reagan’s “I refuse to exploit the youth and inexperience of my opponent” in 1984 to “Let’s Go Brandon!” in the 2020s, he said. “We have moved pretty far past a witty rejoinder.” “It is difficult to imagine what the bottom of this rhetoric looks like, but every time I think we have found it, I am proven wrong,” the speaker said.

Just one month ago, it was claimed that Vice President Biden referred to President Trump as a “sick f—” behind closed doors. Trump rapidly became able to capitalize on these statements. The statement was made by Trump earlier this month during a rally in Rome, Georgia. He stated that everything that Biden touches “turns to sh–.”

On top of that, Smith stated that the departure of seasoned lawmakers, particularly in Congress, most likely indicates that those who would be replacing them will be significantly more inclined to engage in behavior of this nature.

Sen. John Fetterman, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, has stated that he recalls anything that “would once be considered very controversial,” such as someone grinning or saying something somewhat less inflammatory, but that he now sees “no barrier.” He is not always “proud” of the profanity that he uses in the present day.

“But sometimes I use it to perhaps make a point,” he explained to reporters.

The Republican representative from Florida, Matt Gaetz, was criticized by Fetterman in September for the way he dressed. Fetterman responded to Gaetz’s criticism by stating, “How about you get your sh– together and do your job, bud?”

In a similar vein, Senator Jon Tester, a Democrat from Montana, is infamous for using profanity in front of reporters and in formal contexts. In the previous year, he referred to people who commit phone scams as “clowns” and told them to “go get a damn job” during a hearing before a Senate committee.

Despite the fact that Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, has stated that he makes an effort to only use the word “damn” in public, he has been known to use the terms “sh–” and “crap” on X. He stated that it is difficult because “we speak in the language our constituents are speaking, and if you don’t, you can’t reach them.” This is the reason why it is difficult.