And then it all made sense.
“You don’t have to kill the guy, just make him look bad,” said comedian Kurt Metzger on Joe Rogan’s podcast last month, discussing how elites try to destroy political threats they can’t defeat at the ballot box.
That one line explains it all: the hysteria, the lies, the Hollywood hate, the media’s scorched-earth campaign. Since 2016, the Left has launched a nonstop war to delegitimize President Donald Trump—not because he failed, but because he succeeded where they couldn’t.
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“You don’t have to kill the guy, just make him look bad.”
From this obsession, “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” also known as TDS, was born. It has metastasized from elite cocktail parties into a global virus more harmful to America’s image than any foreign propaganda campaign. TDS has not only damaged domestic trust—it’s become America’s most costly export.
A Nation at War With Its Own President
Ask yourself: If Trump were truly the monster his critics claim, what does it say about the country that elected him? If he’s so unfit, how could he beat the entire political class, Hollywood, Wall Street, academia, and the media—twice?
But this isn’t just about Democrats vs. Trump. This is about a disturbing fact: One half of America has spent nearly a decade feeding anti-American narratives to the world just to make one man look bad. If you’re an enemy of the U.S., this is the golden age of free propaganda—funded by American taxpayers and delivered by American institutions.
Since 2016, the legacy media has pummelled Trump with unrelenting negativity. Global audiences have been force-fed images of riots, Russiagate hysteria, impeachment dramas, and social chaos. It’s no wonder the U.S. is now seen not as a beacon of stability but as a battleground of cultural collapse.
Social media only makes it worse. Platforms like X, Facebook, and Instagram amplify every half-truth and out-of-context clip into a five-alarm fire. In this environment, every policy disagreement becomes a constitutional crisis; every Trump speech, a supposed fascist rally; every MAGA voter, a target for ridicule.
The result? The world sees a country that cannot govern itself, a population at war with itself, and a media more interested in defeating Trump than defending national unity.
Bulgaria: A Case Study in American Self-Sabotage
I write this as someone watching from abroad. In Bulgaria, I’ve seen firsthand how TDS has infected not only U.S. discourse but the very perception of America itself.
Let me be blunt: America’s global enemies love Trump Derangement Syndrome.
The traditional anti-American voices in Bulgaria—often funded through murky channels by Moscow or Beijing—have seized on U.S. media narratives to argue that American democracy is a fraud and the U.S. president is a threat to world peace. They’ve been gifted an endless reel of footage, headlines, and talking points courtesy of CNN, MSNBC, and The New York Times.
But more disturbing is the second group: the self-described “civil society activists.” These are people backed by U.S. grant money—via George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, the U.S. Agency for International Development, Radio Free Europe, and even government programs like America for Bulgaria.
Instead of using that support to strengthen pro-American sentiment, they wage war on the very country funding them. They slander Trump daily. They denounce the U.S. as racist, imperialist, and “fascist.” They push deeply unpopular campaigns promoting mass migration, extreme gender ideology, and anti-family narratives that alienate ordinary Bulgarians.
The Real Victims of TDS: Ordinary People
Here’s the truth: This isn’t about defending Trump. It’s about defending the image and credibility of the United States.
The real problem isn’t the radical nongovernmental organizations or the activist journalists—they’re just doing what they’re paid to do. The problem is the regular people, the 9-to-5 workers, who don’t have time to trace the funding pipelines or fact-check the flood of disinformation. They see a divided, unstable America and wonder: is this the model we’re supposed to follow?
Trump said it best: “They’re not coming for me. They’re coming for you. I’m just in the way.”
But TDS isn’t just a psychological condition—it’s a deliberate campaign to weaken America from within and broadcast that weakness abroad.
Restoring the American Image
Trump Derangement Syndrome has done more damage to America’s global standing than any policy disagreement ever could. It’s eroded U.S. soft power, undermined confidence in our institutions, and emboldened enemies from Tehran to Beijing.
It’s time for those who claim to care about democracy and diplomacy to recognize the cost of their obsession. The world is watching. And when the American Left tries to destroy its own president, it sends a message to every country—ally or enemy—that the United States is fractured, fragile, and unfit to lead.
Enough. America doesn’t need to be perfect. But it does need to be proud. That starts by ending the witch hunts, silencing the hysteria, and remembering who the real enemy is.
George Harizanov is CEO of the Institute for Right-Wing Policies in Sofia, Bulgaria.
Reproduced with permission. Original here: Trump Derangement Syndrome Impacts America’s Global Image