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The president is the only person in the United States with the megaphone to speak to the nation and guide them through moments of tragedy. This morning, Donald Trump used that megaphone to hijack the apparent murder of the director Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, in service of his political grievances.
“A very sad thing happened last night in Hollywood. Rob Reiner, a tortured and struggling, but once very talented movie director and comedy star, has passed away, together with his wife, Michele, reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, sometimes referred to as TDS,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “He was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump.” He then closed, incongruously, “May Rob and Michele rest in peace!”
The post was nauseating even by Trump’s standards. Though Reiner was an outspoken Trump critic and longtime progressive activist, no serious reports have tied the deaths to his politics. Police have arrested the Reiners’ younger son, who had spoken publicly about struggling with addiction and homelessness. This makes Trump’s post seem even stranger. Did he invent this idea in the hope that a Trump supporter had killed the Reiners? Was his post intended as a threat to other anti-Trump people, warning that speaking out might get them killed? Is he simply extraordinarily cruel?
Looking for a considered meaning in Trump’s words might be a wild-goose chase, though. The simplest reason Trump posted this is the same reason he posts anything: The man cannot resist making everything about himself, even if it’s the heartbreaking murder of a beloved artist in an alleged domestic dispute. If “TDS” is the tendency to become irrationally obsessed with Donald Trump and project that obsession onto everyone else, then somebody is indeed deranged, and it wasn’t Rob Reiner.
Trump’s post creates some pungent ironies. “You won’t see people on the right celebrating the horrific murder of Rob Reiner and his wife,” the Trump ally and conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec wrote on X last night. “Compare to the Left’s reaction to Charlie Kirk’s murder,” Posobiec added. That’s an illuminating comparison. When Kirk critics brought up his more inflammatory rhetoric after his assassination in September, some prominent figures on the right, including the attorney general, accused them of hate speech, and scores were fired from their jobs. (This came at the same time that many right-wing pundits were celebrating Kirk as a champion of free speech.) Evidently the same standards don’t apply to Trump—though the replies to his post on Truth Social suggest some revulsion even among the kind of devoted fans who hang out on his personal social network.
Trump has never shined in moments that call for dignity and restraint. Yesterday, discussing the mass shooting at Brown University on Saturday, the president seemed cold: “Things can happen,” he said. Empathy does not come naturally to him, even when it would be politically beneficial. Visiting Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria during his first term, Trump gave us the indelible image of tossing paper-towel rolls to beleaguered survivors.
This is what makes Trump’s post about the Reiners not just despicable and cruel but also bad for the country. In moments of national mourning or trauma, a president can seek to bring people together: Think of Ronald Reagan’s remarks after the Challenger disaster, George W. Bush’s speech atop the rubble at Ground Zero, or Barack Obama’s eulogy at the memorial for victims of the Mother Emanuel massacre. Absent these presidents’ genuine ability and instinct to inspire unity, a leader can fake it, offering at least a boilerplate statement. If nothing else, they can just keep quiet.
But not Trump. He finds the most divisive way to insert himself. The president began this year with another lowlight: After an air crash over the Potomac River in Washington, Trump was quick to point fingers (DEI was, absurdly, one of the supposed culprits) and slow to console. His choices deny the country a chance to mourn, and they take moments that could be unifying—surely Americans of all political views can agree on the greatness of When Harry Met Sally and The Princess Bride—and turn them into opportunities for anger.
Which is, in effect, Trump’s political project. As James Mattis, Trump’s first defense secretary, said in June 2020, “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us.” Some signs have emerged of Americans rejecting this attitude, including huge “No Kings” protests and Trump’s sinking approval rating. But by other measures, Trump has been successful. The country is sad, angry, and divided—coming to resemble its president more all the time.
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