A new psychological study has found that people who report favorable views of Donald Trump also tend to score higher on measures of callousness, manipulation, and other malevolent traits—and lower on empathy and compassion.

 

I have read and heard that people often ask how MAGA can still support Trump after all these years and after witnessing his sociopathy. This prestigious publication gives us an insight into why people still support him. And it's chilling -- chilling to know that so many Americans who continue to support Trump are like this.

Trump supporters report higher levels of psychopathy, manipulativeness, callousness, and narcissism 

 A new psychological study has found that people who report favorable views of Donald Trump also tend to score higher on measures of callousness, manipulation, and other malevolent traits—and lower on empathy and compassion. 

The findings, based on two large surveys of U.S. adults, shed light on how personality traits relate to political beliefs, including support for Trump and conservative ideology. The research was recently published in the Journal of Research in Personality. 

 Malevolent personality traits—sometimes called “dark” traits—include tendencies such as manipulativeness, callousness, narcissism, and a lack of empathy. These traits are often captured by concepts like psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism, which together reflect a general disposition toward exploiting or disregarding others for personal gain. 

People with stronger malevolent traits may be more comfortable with aggression, dominance, or cruelty and less likely to value fairness or kindness. These tendencies are associated with lower levels of affective empathy (concern for others’ suffering) and, in some cases, higher levels of dissonant empathy (enjoyment of others’ pain). In contrast, benevolent traits reflect the opposite—a disposition marked by compassion, humanism, and a belief in treating others with dignity and respect.

 the Journal of Research in Personality (JRP) is a highly legitimate and prestigious academic journal.

It is a well-established, peer-reviewed publication covering the field of personality psychology. It is published by Elsevier, one of the largest and most reputable scientific publishers in the world. [1, 2]

The journal's credibility is backed by several industry-standard metrics:

• Indexing: The journal is indexed in major academic databases, including the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) and Scopus, which filters out predatory or illegitimate journals. [1, 2]
• Impact & Ranking: It holds a Q1 ranking (the highest quartile) in SCImago for social psychology, with a Journal Impact Factor of 3.4. [1, 2]
• History: It has been continuously published since 1973 (originally established as the Journal of Experimental Research in Personality before renaming in 1975). [1]

It is widely considered a top-tier outlet for empirical and theoretical work on personality traits, dynamics, and processes. [1]

"...a very small price to pay."

By now, you've probably heard that during a campaign rally in Grand Island, Nebraska, on Monday, Trump made the following remarks while discussing gas prices and the ongoing war with Iran: 

“And again, remember, with the war, it's just artificial. It's a little bit high. It's a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe. They can take out a city. Let them take out Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay, and it's going to be over with very soon.”

We are at war with Iran. Those words, coming from the mouth of the President of the United States, sound like "giving aid and comfort to an enemy," to me and to many other Americans.

This is not funny; it isn't a joke, and it isn't "Trump being Trump," because those words should NEVER come from the lips of any American while we are at war with our enemy, never mind the POTUS. 

This is Trump's id, again, showing us all his uncensored thinking and his uncensored self. And it shows us his complete disregard for his fellow Americans, because those words were in response to a criticisms about the price of fuel brought on by his disastrous and poorly thought out war with Iran. 

We all know that the one thing Trump cannot deal with is criticism about anything he does. His was angered by those criticisms; and as a result, his sense of self-esteem, self-importance, and self-image were injured.  There is only one thing that drives Trump: his ego and sense of self-importance, his false image of his invincibility and greatness (reinforced by his feckless enablers and cultists).

When he suffers an injury to his ego, he engages in ad hominem attacks on women, men, political rivals, former presidents, heads of state, even members of his own party, because the injury is unbearable to someone who suffers from the personality disorder he has. 

GUEST POST BY DAVE MILLER

Where's Your Outrage Now? 

Where are you, Ms. Z? Where are you, Mustang? Where are you Sam Huntington, -FJ, Baysider, Jess, Jeffery, and the rest of you living souls who are part of the group of bloggers that frequents Geeez? Are any of you awake? 

For years you’ve decried the Democrats for trying to bribe voters with low-cost medical care, welfare for poor people, and loads of other “free stuff.” All of you have prattled on for years about how “buying votes” with giveaways would be the death of America. 

For years you’ve called the American people stupid for falling for such craven bribery, and you’ve gone on and on about low-IQ voters falling for such chicanery. “How can we afford such giveaways?” you always asked. Well, where are you now? Never in the history of our republic has a president of the United States been so brazen as to openly promise Americans cash if his party wins an election. Until now. 

Here’s what our president, the man you all helped put in office, had to say: “If Republicans win the House of Representatives and the Senate in the 2026 Midterm Elections, I’m going to give all adult citizens in the United States of America, $5,000! Thank you for your attention to this matter, and I look forward to signing those checks!” And it’s not the first time he’s said it, so let’s be honest. 

He means it. 

Because in September, he said essentially the same thing. Back then, we could have dismissed it as another off-the-cuff Trump promise. But now he’s repeated it. So let me ask you: Is President Trump selling America down the river by saddling us with more than $1 trillion in additional spending just to buy an election? Are Republicans so stupid, as you’ve all called Democrats over the years, that they’ll vote for the GOP in November just to get their checks? 

Where’s your outrage now? Where’s your disgust? Where are your furious blog posts, angry with a president and political party that care more about winning than America? 

Patriotic America lovers. That’s how you all portray yourselves. Well, here’s your chance to prove it. Here’s your chance to show us all that your values and your words are not simply tied to a party or favored candidate. 

This election, here’s what America needs you to do: Skip voting in the House and Senate races. Go ahead and vote Republican in all your local races, but skip the House and Senate races. If your words over the years have meant anything, if you meant it when you said bribing Americans to get their votes was an assault on the freedoms of America, you simply cannot vote for the GOP in the House and Senate races. Because every vote for a Republican House or Senate candidate is a vote to enable more than $1 trillion in additional federal spending for the USA. 

Each vote for a House or Senate GOP candidate says you are, in fact, okay with buying votes. And it says you are not the patriots and America lovers you’ve always called yourselves. In fact, it says you are nothing more than craven partisans, willing to sacrifice your long-held values just to win an election and hopefully get a $5,000 check. 

 ****************************

I agree with Dave on this, and, in fact, I add this to his post:

Every time Trump promises to send Americans money in exchange for their votes, we have to do the math, because that is where the promise immediately falls apart. 

There are roughly 245 million adults in this country. That is $1.20 trillion. The president does not have the authority to just send out checks on a whim, and he certainly can’t spend more than a trillion dollars without approval. That is not even taking into account the practical side of things, like where the money would come from. 

Donald Trump also promised $2,000 tariff dividend checks. Those never came, and these never will either. He knows that, and he also knows that there is almost no realistic path for Republicans to hold both chambers of Congress. So the excuse and the scapegoat are already built in for when the checks are never sent. He will blame the Democrats. He will say he wanted to send the checks, but the radical left “Dumocrats” blocked him from sending them. 

He will use this as another reason to further divide us.

YOUR SUNDAY MOMENT OF ZEN

 

“If someone is able to show me that what I think or do is not right, I will happily change, for I seek the truth, by which no one was ever truly harmed. It is the person who continues in his self-deception and ignorance who is harmed.” ― Marcus Aurelius, Meditation

Well, there it is.

 

President Donald Trump stated in an interview with TIME published on October 1, 2026, that he has not ruled out declaring a national emergency or invoking the Insurrection Act around the November midterm elections.[1]

When asked by TIME reporters about the limits of his presidential power regarding the upcoming midterms, Trump declined to set boundaries, stating: [1]

“I'm not committing to anything.”
“We're going to see how it plays out in court.”
“I don't rule anything out or in. We'll see. You mean the Insurrection Act? No, I've never used it. I could use it. A lot of people think I should use it sometimes.”

****************************

No American president has ever invoked the Insurrection Act during a mid-term election.  

What possible reason could Trump have for even suggesting the use of the Insurrection Act? 

According to a TIME Magazine interview published on October 1, 2026, President Donald Trump’s statements regarding the potential use of the Insurrection Act of 1807 around the 2026 mid-term elections are tied to a combination of political anxieties, escalating pressure from his supporters, and ongoing rhetoric regarding civil unrest. 

Reporting from various media outlets details the primary motivations and arguments surrounding his refusal to rule out invoking the act.

It appears there is no legitimate reason to Trump's idea of invoking the Insurrection Act, except to disrupt the election that he and his administration believe they're going to lose badly. This would be the sort of thing a corrupt president would do, and in historical cases, it is what authoritarians and dictators do.

Dictators and authoritarian leaders frequently interfere with and disrupt their countries' elections by employing a mix of technical, legal, and physical tactics designed to maintain their grip on power. Modern authoritarians often rely on a "digital authoritarianism" playbook, using infrastructure control to tilt the playing field while maintaining a façade of legitimacy. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Data from organizations like Freedom House indicates that election-related digital interference occurs globally, with dozens of countries executing deliberate internet or social media outages specifically timed around electoral cycles to control information and hobble opposition groups. [1, 2, 3]

What are the chances that Trump will attempt this? He's corrupt, dangerous, and stupid. We can only guess what the malignant narcissist will do. 

Via AI Overview:

"The Insurrection Act of 1807 has been officially invoked over 30 times by 15 different U.S. presidents, but historically, it has never been used for the purpose of altering, monitoring, or interfering with an election. 

Legal and historical records from organizations like the Brennan Center for Justice outline that its historical uses have been strictly limited to situations such as suppressing domestic rebellions, enforcing civil rights laws (like school desegregation), and quelling civil unrest or labor violence. Brennan Center for Justice."

The law was last invoked over three decades ago by President George H.W. Bush in May 1992 to restore order during the Los Angeles riots.   

 Legal scholars and constitutional experts note that the Insurrection Act grants the executive branch no authority over election dates, voter eligibility, or election administration, which remain under the purview of states and Congress. Furthermore, defense officials have publicly reinforced that the military has no role to play in administering mid-term elections