From Watergate to Trump: How presidential lies went from scandal to strategy

For 50 years, presidential dishonesty was something to expose. Today, it’s something millions celebrate.

Image generated by ChatGPT from prompts written by the author.

In the summer of 2012, my editor assigned me to cover the 40th anniversary of the Watergate break-in that ultimately led to President Richard Nixon’s downfall.

I interviewed Dennis Goldford, chair of the Drake University political science department and my former teacher. I asked him what he thought the true legacy of the Watergate scandal was. He asked me when I was born.

“1975,” I said.

“You’re not going to believe this,” he replied, “but there was a time when people believed what the president of the United States said.”

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The line gobsmacked me. Goldford was right. I grew up in an America that distrusted its politicians. I don’t remember Ford or Carter, but I remember Reagan. My father, who cast his first vote for FDR, revered Reagan — and still believed the administration lied about Iran-Contra.

George H.W. Bush, a former CIA director, knew how to lie. Most people remember his “Read my lips: No new taxes” pledge as his big lie. But the incubator baby hoax —repeated by Bush to justify war in Iraq — was far worse.

Fabricated by a PR firm for the Kuwaiti government, the story said Iraqi soldiers babies out of incubators when they invaded Kuwait. This lie helped tip the Senate to narrowly authorize the Gulf War.

America, still weary from Vietnam, had ignored Iraq’s past atrocities, including Saddam Hussein’s use of poison gas in 1988.

Bill Clinton lied so often he was nicknamed the “Velcro president”—everything stuck. His denial of a sexual affair with a White House intern became his signature lie.

Some defenders dismissed it as personal business, but Clinton pulled back from bombing Osama bin Laden amid criticism that he was wagging the dog. The 9/11 Commission said politics didn’t influence the decision, but how can we be sure when his lies were so frequent?

George W. Bush launched the Iraq War on the lie that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. He didn’t. Bush linked Iraq to 9/11, though Iraq played no role. His team seemed more focused on selling the lie than proving it.

Barack Obama’s biggest lie came in 2013: “Nobody is listening to your phone calls.” Edward Snowden later revealed the NSA was doing just that — collecting massive call data and, in some cases, listening without warrants.

Goldford was right: by 2012, no one believed the president — and with good reason. But Trump shattered even that low standard. He wasn’t just another liar. He made lying the point.

The Washington Post counted over 30,000 false or misleading claims in Trump’s first term. He isn’t even a good liar — just relentless. Yet for a disturbingly large group, his word is gospel.

His lies about the 2020 election incited an attack on the Capitol that temporarily halted the peaceful transfer of power. Some still call it a “peaceful protest,” despite the deaths it caused.

He downplayed COVID-19, costing hundreds of thousands of lives. His followers now believe the vaccine was poison and that public health was a socialist plot.

I don’t know how to confront willful ignorance on this scale. If Watergate proved that lies could destroy a presidency, Trump proved the opposite: lie big enough, loud enough, and often enough, and you can become king.

Nixon tried to hide the truth. He was undone by it. Trump obliterated truth, then thrived in the wreckage.

What did we learn from Watergate?
Lie bigger. Lie more.
The truth no longer matters.

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Daniel P. Finney is a member of the Iowa Writers Collaborative, but don’t hold that against them. Please visit their page to view a full roster of writers and consider subscribing to their columns. Writing is hard work; people ought to get paid for it. If you enjoy it, throw them a couple of bucks. They earned it.