292 - Jason Stanley: Breaking Down Trump’s Propaganda

Jason Stanley is the Bissell-Heyd-Associates Chair in American Studies at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy at the University of Toronto, where he is also Professor of Philosophy. Before moving to Toronto in 2025, he was the Jacob Urowsky Professor of Philosophy at Yale University. Jason’s work focuses on propaganda, authoritarianism, democracy, free speech, and political language. In this episode, Robinson and Jason discuss Jason’s account of how political propaganda has changed during the Trump era. More particularly, they talk about soft and hard propaganda, social media and political bots, Trump’s political communication, Jason’s decision to leave Twitter and later the United States, and the effects of online attacks. They also discuss artificial intelligence and democracy, the political influence of tech billionaires, Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, and Jason’s transition toward the philosophy of propaganda. Jason’s most recent book is Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future (Atria/One Signal, 2024).

Jason’s Website: https://jasonstanley.org

How Propaganda Works: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Jason+Stanley+How+Propaganda+Works

Erasing History: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Jason+Stanley+Erasing+History

OUTLINE

00:00 How Propaganda Has Changed with Donald Trump

10:42 Soft and Hard Propaganda

13:56 Defining Propaganda

25:01 Is Trump Trying to Broaden Popular Support?

30:12 Trump Is Ruining Democracy

33:15 Social Media is Political Theater for BOTS

45:39 Why Jason Left Twitter

49:54 Attacks Against Jason on Twitter

53:20 The Terrible Cost of Leaving the US

01:04:56 How AI Threatens Democracy

01:08:26 Tech Billionaires Want to Wipe Out Humanity

01:12:02 Elon Musk's Secret Plans

01:14:30 Does Peter Thiel Want All Humans Dead?

01:17:37 Jason's Transition to Philosophy of Propaganda

Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University, where he is also a JD candidate in the Law School.