What you can
learn about communication from listening to Trump’s 2001 call with Georgia
election officials
I just
listened again to
Trump’s Jan. 3, 2001 phone call with the Georgia Secretary of
State to discuss voting irregularities in November 2000’s presidential election
– won by Joe Biden.
This
hour-long call, recorded by the Georgia side, preserves live evidence of Trump’s
lies about the election, his disregard for protocol, his arrogance, and his willingness
to bully and threaten any honest administrators who stand in his way.
And now we
know the call will likely end up being key evidence in Trump’s upcoming
criminal trial in Georgia for his efforts to overturn the election results.
But the
call is also a faithful record of a neurotic fraudster hard at work, used to
getting his own way.
As a professional communicator, here are my observations about Trump’s historic call.
·
When
trying to influence other people’s behaviour, you should listen hard to what
they say, and work diligently to earn their trust. Trump, by contrast, probably
spoke for 50 minutes of the 60-minute call, offering examples after examples
(all unproven and unsupported by any evidence) of Democratic cheating and
ballot-box stuffing. His Big Lie: “Everyone knows I won the state by hundreds
of thousands of votes.”
When Georgia Secretary of State Brad
Raffensperger tried to get a word in edgewise, Trump would simply interrupt, pointing (without details) to all the official sources and YouTube
videos that supposedly prove his charges. He never bothered to listen. He never
asked Raffensperger to explain what steps Georgia had taken to assure the
legality of the election. He had become too used to dictating outcomes.
·
A phone call with Trump can be very
intimidating. With his booming voice and confident air, he’s a hard man to
argue with. He runs roughshod over your assertions the same way he owns the
media, by ignoring your arguments and pressing his own talking points again and
again. His sources are always “Everybody says,” “very smart people say,”
“everybody knows this,” and “you know this is true.”
“It’s very simple,” Trump kept
repeating. “We won the election.”
·
“Now you
know it.” To support his case. Trump told a number of horror stories, about
cheating by Dominion voting machines, Democratic vote dumps, ballot-fixing by
one election worker, and even a dump of military and overseas votes that Trump argued
should have all gone to him. “Maybe you didn’t know that,” he said, “but now
you know it.” This suggests that Trump still believes, despite his reputation
as a serial liar, that when he states something, that’s equivalent to it being
an unqualified fact – or at least should be perceived that way. His
self-confidence is admirable, but his ability to delude himself is somewhat
less so.
·
Of course, what works in a press scrum or at a Trump
rally isn't as effective when dealing with sophisticated, articulate
professionals. Trump kept punching, but he wasn’t smart enough to land a single
blow. Georgia election officials had already re-counted the ballots and
reviewed supposed irregularities, and they stood by their statement that Biden
won the state fairly. Finding himself facing ethical people who knew their
stuff, Trump had no idea what to do except… up the ante.
· Trump aimed threat after threat at the Georgia
officials. “You're approving an illegal election… Georgians know it … the
people of Georgia are so angry…. They will hate you.” He also suggested that
they should change the result soon, to avoid angering state Republicans who
would be voting in two senate runoff votes a few days later. (Both seats were
won narrowly by Democratic candidates, crucially shifting the balance of power
to the Dems).” The final threat: that both Raffensperger and his lawyer, who
was also on the call as a voice of reason, could face legal jeopardy for supporting
an illegitimate election outcome. Defending Biden’s victory, he warned darkly,
“could be very costly in many ways.”
Had Trump tried to reason with the Georgia
team rather than threaten them, how might history have changed? The Senate
elections a few days later might have gone different ways: the Democrats won
one election by just 1% of the vote and the other election by just 2%.
· The Georgia team remained calm and steadfast. “Mr.
President, you have people that submit information, and we have our people that
submit information, and then it comes before a court. And the court then has to
make a determination. We have to stand by our numbers, we believe our numbers
are right.”
Trump’s rebuttal: “Your numbers aren’t right,
they’re really wrong. And they’re really wrong, Brad… Ultimately, I win,
because you guys are so wrong, and you have treated the population of Georgia
so badly.” Then he went on to complain about what a mistake it had been to
endorse Georgia’s governor in the last election… proof that if you let a
blowhard talk long enough, he will usually just lose his focus and his way.
· Of
course, Trump also played the party card. Knowing he was dealing with
Republicans, he added, “Why
don't you want to find this? What’s wrong with you?” It’s a clear insight into Trump’s
belief that loyalty to party should rank above one’s obligation to the public
or democracy. (Unless, of course, he’s the one being disloyal to the party.)
·
When Trump saw his bullying wasn’t working, he
resorted to bargaining. “Brad, what are we going to do? We won the election,
and it’s not fair to take it away from us like this.”
How his lawyers must have squirmed when Trump
pleaded, “I just want to find 11,780 votes” (the difference between his vote
count and Biden’s).
·
At the end, the lawyers on the call agreed to
meet again the next day to review the evidence on both sides. But it was clear
Georgia’s officials weren't going to budge. Trump tried to play the statesman
by saying, “Brad, we just want the truth. It’s simple.” But then Trump revealed
that only he gets to define what is the truth. “The truth is that I won by
400,000 votes.”
****
I’ve always maintained that Trump’s narcissism, ego and
lack of self-awareness make him the opposite of a successful entrepreneur.
Great leaders tell the truth, listen to others, prize reputation over ambition, and guard their integrity. With none of those virtues, Trump will go
down in history as a historic loser.
PS: Kudos to Georgia Secretary of State Brad
Raffensperger, who defied Trump, party interests and the MAGA mob to defend the
truth. Just the other day he tweeted: "The most
basic principles of a strong democracy are accountability and respect for the
Constitution and rule of law. You either have it, or you don’t.”
(I just learned that Raffensperger
graduated from engineering at the University of Western Ontario. Go Mustangs!)
