A critique of pure stupidity: understanding Trump 2.0

President Donald Trump holds charts as he speaks about the economy in the Oval Office, August 2025. President Donald Trump holds charts as he speaks about the economy in the Oval Office, August 2025. If the first term of Donald Trump provoked anxiety over the fate of objective knowledge, the second has led to claims we live in a world-historical age of stupid, accelerated by big tech. But might there be a way out? T he first and second Trump administrations have provoked markedly different critical reactions. The shock of 2016 and its aftermath saw a wave of liberal anxiety about the fate of objective knowledge, not only in the US but also in Britain, where the Brexit referendum that year had been won by a campaign that misrepresented key facts and figures.