After making history by becoming the first US president to be impeached twice, Donald Trump addressed the nation in a video message.
He was forced to share the five minute video from the White House Twitter account, after his own was deleted by the social media platform.
The President condemned last week’s Capitol violence, promising that those who engaged in the “troubling” attack will be “brought to justice”.
However he failed to mention the successful efforts to oust him, which resulted in 232 voting in favour of impeachment for inciting insurrection during the riot which saw five people die.
Body language expert Bruce Durham believes Trump is playing “manipulator” in the message, trying to keep his supporters on side while still sending the message he knows everyone says he has to send.
He also compares Trump to a “school child being sent to bed” who is “dragging your heels as you ascend the stairs, kicking every stair as you slowly go and slamming the door when you get up there.”
Bruce shares his expert views on Trump’s video message with The Mirror.
Donald Trump released a speech yesterday and its purported purpose was to calm down tensions before the transition to President Elect Joe Biden occurs.
The real purpose one could offer was to save Donald’s bacon, to try and give some type of pressure relief valve to the impeachment process he now faces. In the recording he referenced the behaviour of his supporters as ‘the calamity at the Capitol’ but, in this presentation, it could be declared that he had a calamity in front of the cameras, not least from whether to believe him or not.
When it comes to reading body language, micro expressions and verbal clues like cadence, inflection and more, it is from these fields that we can gauge the more authentic feelings of the outgoing President rather than just the words he said.
Due to the fame of Donald Trump, and all of his speeches before, we can categorically say that there was a high level of inauthenticity and even discomfort shown by the president.
We can offer this because we have thousands of examples of his ‘base line’ behaviour. What he does most of the time when giving a speech.
Before we start, we need to accept that this is being read from a script, not from the heart. It has been developed with the single intention of supporting the president.
(Image: Getty Images)
This is not an issue in itself, but because of this, it beautifully highlights how aggrieved Trump feels having to say something he so obviously doesn’t believe in!
From a body language perspective, we can look at the grasp of the hands. Trump repeatedly creates a ‘cradle’ of the fingers, a self sooth when the fingers are interlinked. We see no ‘steepling’ of the fingers – where just the tips of the fingers and thumbs touch each other creating a triangle shape.
Anyone in his position, or any politician, will have received communication or media training. They are trained to ‘show’ steeping. They understand that steepling is a ‘power position’ as it shows calmness and authority.
The cradle position however is shown at times when you are uncomfortable with what is being said or what you or someone else is doing. He adopts the cradle position for most of the speech so you can safely ascertain that he is uncomfortable with the majority of the speech.
(Image: Getty Images)
This is backed up by the vast number of times you can clearly see his thumbs ‘self-soothing’ – a rub of thumbs that give the person comfort in an uncomfortable time.
In this speech we do not hear any of the spin that Trump is famous for. In every single speech that he has gave, something is the best in the world, something is fabulous, ground-breaking, it’s the best the universe has ever saw.
It’s a psychological approach that can change the thinking of even the harshest critic. And he says this with vigour. We know his base line behaviour includes this method, yet here, there is nothing. No spin, no energy, no nothing. And there is nothing because he doesn’t want to say it, it’s not his idea, nor even his choice.
Another factor to note is his cadence and inflection. Donald is a very capable orator. Quick witted, sharp and has the ability to charm, but here in this speech, you will notice a drawl, a fatigued energy, but he is over emphasising it.
This is Trump being defiant. Yes he is being made to say it, yes he knows it will help him right now, but that huge dose of narcissism within Trump does not like having to follow anyone else’s rules but Donald’s.
By slowing down his speech, by making it so obvious, this is Trump playing mind games. He is showing, if only to himself, that he is still in control of the situation. Apathy is also at play here, a bit like a school child being sent to bed, but dragging your heels as you ascend the stairs, kicking every stair as you slowly go and slamming the door when you get up there.
(Image: REUTERS)
But, there is also a more powerful message here. He is overemphasizing the message as he wants to show that he is towing the line (to a small extent at least purely from a self-preservation standpoint) but he also wants to make it clear to his supporters that he is being placed under duress to relay this message.
Remember, he said that he would be there with his supporters marching on The Capitol. It was Trump who sparked the idea. His response to the violence was anything but prompt and lacked any substance whatsoever.
So with Trump playing mind games, by trying to keep his supporters on side but delivering the speech so he can say he said it, we see Trump the manipulator in all his glory doing what he does best, and that is only caring about Donald.
