OPINION: Vance pushes racist lies, Trump just makes stuff up. Are they even trying to win?

Donald Trump’s reelection campaign seems to now be 50% incoherent babbling and 50% profoundly racist lies, a mix that begs the question: Are Trump and his running mate JD Vance actually trying to win the election?

Fortunately, I know the answer, thanks to this 100% not-made-up transcript of a recent Trump campaign strategy session that I was handed by one of my many GOP sources, of whom I have none:

All right, gang, let’s start with the most important news. We’re doing great, and we’re definitely going to make America great again. Or is it “again again”? What is the slogan now? Never mind. Doesn’t matter.

JD Vance, you're doing the best job ever at spreading racist lies

Let’s start with JD. Sen. Vance, you have been absolutely knocking it out of the park with the crazy stuff you’ve been saying about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. Super smart, totally fake and mega-hateful nonsense. We love it.

Not only have you disrupted life in a small Midwestern city and caused a bunch of legal, hardworking immigrants to live in fear, you even got The Wall Street Journal to write an entire piece showing every claim you’ve made has been fabricated. You know our slogan: If the news media and readily available information say we’re lying, we’re winning!

Let’s have a big round of applause for JD, because even in the face of withering criticism and facts, he has pushed forward with this inhumane, ginned-up story, likely helping us lock down the votes of men age 40 and over who no longer get invited to family Thanksgiving dinners.

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On Wednesday, when presented with the so-called fact that the Haitian immigrants in Springfield are in the country legally, JD told both reality and basic human decency to shove it and said: “I’m still gonna call them an illegal alien.”

BOOM! Any avowed racists out there who were undecided just moved right into the Trump/Vance column, baby. This is right in line with our primary campaign motto: Facts are stupid, you whiny losers!

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, you came out of nowhere to rightfully mock Harris for not giving birth to children

I also want to give a quick hat tip to Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders for her appearance with President Trump at a Flint, Michigan, town hall where she mocked Kamala Harris for not having biological children: “So my kids keep me humble. Unfortunately, Kamala Harris doesn’t have anything keeping her humble.”

Nailed it, Sarah! With JD “Childless Cat Lady” Vance leading this effort, we have been able to alienate female voters at a rate we never thought possible. Remember, we don’t want those voters. Women – eww, am I right guys?

A quick note to all the women on the Trump campaign who are listening, remember you all signed an NDA.

We can't forget Trump's effort to continue trying to drive away voters

Anyhoo, let’s get to the big man, President Trump, who has been out there winning over absolutely zero new voters. That’s how we drew things up. We’re going to win OUR WAY, which is catering only to people who have already purchased at least one pair of Trump sneakers or two or more Trump Bibles.

To that end, our leader has been talking absolute gobbledygook, keeping everyone on their heels. Is he making sense? Does he know what he’s talking about? Those are the kinds of questions we want voters asking themselves with just weeks to go before an election that we will say we won even if we don’t win.

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Wednesday night on Fox News, President Trump talked about his debate with Kamala Harris and complained that the moderators were correcting him too much, saying “the audience was absolutely, they went crazy.”

That was genius. Since there was no live audience at the debate, his new comment leaves voters wondering if President Trump is now seeing things or suffering from short-term memory loss. Perfect. It's a real alpha move.

Let’s look at this perfect answer the president gave at the Michigan event when he was asked about “the major threats to the future of Michigan manufacturing/auto-working jobs” and what he will do to “eliminate those threats.”

His answer: “To me we have one really major threat, that’s called nuclear weapons. We have other countries that are hostile to us, they don’t have to be hostile to us. I always say if you have a smart president, you’ll never have a problem with China, Russia or any of them, OK? I got along great with Putin, I got along great with President Xi, I got along great with Kim Jong Un of North Korea. Everybody said, ‘Oh you can’t get along with him.’ He liked me, I got along great with him and he has a lot of nuclear force. But you essentially have five countries and you’re going to have more. ... It’s the single biggest threat to the world ? not only Michigan, to the world.”

Again, perfect. It does absolutely nothing to answer the question; it allows our candidate to talk about the dictators he loves and admires, and it will scare low-information voters who, up to this point, probably didn’t see nuclear weapons as a major threat to the auto industry.

Brilliant job, sir.

Just to be sure we lose, we must continue to push for a government shutdown

We’ve also been aggressively pushing for a government shutdown right before the election, which everyone knows is smart.

And there’s this recent Truth Social post from President Trump: “Illegal Migrants who are POURING INTO OUR COUNTRY, in record numbers, are taking the JOBS away from Black and Hispanic people who have held them for years. It is devastating for the Black and Hispanic patriots of our Nation.”

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That checks many of our strategic boxes. Dishonest? Check. Kinda crazy sounding? Check. Will only appeal to people who already support us? Check. Pretty darn racist? Double check!

Team, it’s clear we are 110% committed to doing everything we can to not give a damn whether we get more votes in this election. Because guess what? If we lose, we just say we won and let our friends in Congress and on the U.S. Supreme Court do the rest!

Now, get out there and commit some political malpractice. And don’t forget the Trump/Vance team’s core message: (Expletive) you, voters!

Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on X, formerly Twitter, @RexHuppke and Facebook facebook.com/RexIsAJerk

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: OPINION: Trump, Vance lean into racist lies. Are they trying to lose?