As the nation approaches midterm elections, President Trump has escalated a campaign characterizing the Democratic Party as communist, according to reporting from voters and analysts observing the political landscape. During a recent special runoff election in South Carolina for a US Senate seat, Trump visited the state to promote his favored candidate and repeatedly invoked the term communism, mentioning it at least 13 times during a rally in Myrtle Beach. Trump framed the choice for voters in stark terms, stating that one cannot simultaneously be a communist and a patriot.
Interviews with South Carolina voters reveal mixed responses to this messaging. Some Republican voters expressed concern about socialist influence within Democratic circles, citing the Democratic Socialists of America and citing recent primary victories of progressive candidates in other states. However, not all voters spontaneously raised communism concerns, with some instead focusing on other policy matters such as socialism in certain regions or concerns about freedom and government accountability.
Academics and media observers note that conservative-leaning media outlets have amplified Trump’s anticommunist rhetoric. Brian Leiter, a law professor at the University of Chicago, argues that Trump and Fox News work in coordinated fashion on these messaging themes, with Fox News transcripts showing sharp increases in mentions of socialism and communism since earlier in the year. Leiter contextualizes Trump’s approach within a longer American history of red-baiting tactics, drawing parallels to Cold War-era political persecution.
Progressive victories by candidates such as Zohran Mamdani and others have been framed by conservative media as evidence of communist influence within Democratic politics. Critics of this characterization note that such rhetoric often conflates democratic socialism with communism, and that media coverage sometimes selectively features DSA members whose messaging may not represent mainstream Democratic positions or the nuanced views of elected progressive officials.
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