Donald Trump Has Totally Jumped the Shark
Once upon a time, he was must-see TV. Now, everyone is tuning out his boring show.
I got an email Thursday morning from a dear old friend of mine. He lives in Virginia. He’s a Democrat who was never susceptible to Donald Trump’s alleged allures. But he did make an interesting point. Years ago, my friend wrote, he used to watch Trump and maybe give some consideration to a couple of the points he made, or at least be entertained. “I turn him off when I see him now,” my friend wrote—and he guessed millions of others did the same.
Trump is staring down the business end of a number of problems right now. There’s Project 2025, and there’s his bragging about ending Roe, and there’s the hefty ankle weight that is J.D. Vance. But for all those things and more, public lack of interest may be Trump’s biggest problem as we enter the homestretch of the presidential race next week. Since the man sees life wholly in terms of acts and star power and ratings, let’s think of him on the terms he understands. The Trump Show has entered its ninth season. That’s a long run for any TV show. Many of the most iconic shows in television history didn’t last that long.
There’s a reason for that: In TV world, longevity can be a curse. Shows lose their originality. They lose key characters. They introduce new ones who aren’t nearly as compelling. They jump the shark, in a phrase coined in 1985 by a radio personality who was discussing an iconically far-fetched 1977 episode of Happy Days when Fonzie literally jumped over a shark while on water skis.
That’s Trump today. Fonzie on water skis. All in the Family after Meathead and Gloria moved to California. Buffy by season 6 (although they still delivered a few classics in the last two seasons). The Office after Michael Scott left, which pulled off the accomplishment of making even Will Farrell unfunny. (I’m sorry I don’t have more recent reference points, but you can fill in your own.)
Trump’s ratings are down. Kamala Harris drew 28.9 million viewers for her convention speech; Trump, just 26.3. There are all those videos of loads of empty seats at his rallies, and columns of people streaming out while he’s speaking. His unfavorable rating, which ticked down a bit after the assassination attempt and the GOP convention, is ticking back up. In poll after poll after poll, both nationally and in swing states, he’s going from four- and five- and six-point leads to one-, two-, or three-point deficits. The race is still close, but the swing is unmistakable.
Trump’s act is old. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still offensive. That Arlington Cemetery stunt was gobsmacking. It’s now a three-day story, and as long as Trumpworld keeps fighting and escalating, trying to convince voters that they should distrust the not-handsomely-paid people who stand guard over ground that your average American considers to be among the most sacred in the nation, it’ll continue. Three days means it’s really getting through, becoming quasi-foundational. It’s reinforcing the view—potentially deadly to him—that he has contempt for veterans and soldiers who died serving the country.
And of course he still says and promotes all kinds of offensive and alarming things. His repost of a “joke” mentioning Harris and Hillary Clinton and blow jobs (I’ll stop there). Those photos he posted of Democrats and others (Bill Gates?) in orange jumpsuits, reinforcing earlier promises about how he’ll pursue “justice” if elected. There’s still plenty of reason to be terrified of a second Trump term, especially if you’re an undocumented immigrant or a transgender person or anyone else he considers “vermin.”
But again, for now, let’s just judge him as an act. His act is way tired. It’s now nine years of “Fake news” and “You won’t have a country anymore” and all the rest. In 2015, all those Trumpisms were stupid and disgusting; but at least they were new. I actually laughed when he described Jeb Bush as a “low-energy person.” He was! I could imagine then how, for voters who didn’t hate him, he was interesting and possibly amusing as a species that American politics rarely produces: someone who threw the script in the air and said whatever the hell popped into his mind.
That was bound to be something people wanted to watch, for a while. And it was just as bound to be something that became less compelling over time. It’s an act. And this is a key difference between politics and show business that Trump can’t see. In showbiz, and on TV, it’s all about whether the production values can sell the act. In politics, it turns out, the act needs more than slick production. It still needs to show some connection to people’s lives and concerns. Harris is better at that than Trump is. And her act is a lot fresher, too. And Walz’s act versus Vance’s? Not remotely close. Yes—Walz is so compelling, and Vance so repelling, that this is one election where the veep choices may actually make two points’ worth of difference.
None of this means Trump is finished. Happy Days lasted several seasons after it literally jumped the shark. But the ratings did start to fall soon enough. No one ever hated Fonzie, like many do Trump. But even fans of the show became a lot less invested in it. My old friend reminded me of the quote by Elie Wiesel: “The opposite of love is not hate. It’s indifference.”
This article first appeared in Fighting Words, a weekly TNR newsletter authored by editor Michael Tomasky. Sign up here.
