In a televised address from the White House in early 2025, Donald Trump, standing beside an oversized chart listing tariff hikes on dozens of nations, declared that “For decades our country has been looted, pillaged, raped, and plundered.” To cheering supporters, he promised that this would end now. America, he said, would finally strike back.

Trump’s rhetoric of victimhood is hardly new. But according to a recent study published in Journalism and Media, the way he uses it has shifted—and evolved into something more consequential.

The study’s author, Dr. Marianna Patrona of the Hellenic Army Academy, calls this a “novel communicative pattern” that pairs narratives of national suffering with promises of economic retribution. It’s a form of rhetorical judo: the United States as long-suffering victim turned avenger on the world stage.

Her research forensically analyzed how political leaders wield language to justify sweeping policy decisions. Specifically, she focused on Trump’s dramatic overhaul of U.S. trade relations with the world.

The Language of Pain and Payback

To conduct her analysis, Patrona sifted through years of Trump’s public statements (campaign speeches, media appearances, rallies, and social media posts) focusing on the period from 2020 through early 2025. Using a method known as Critical Discourse Analysis, she traced how Trump’s rhetoric evolved after he returned to power in the 2024 election.

In Trump’s earlier political life, claims of victimhood revolved around himself. He called investigations into his conduct “witch hunts,” and denounced journalists as part of a corrupt elite determined to bring him down. But after the 2024 election, Patrona observed something new: the personal grievances had metastasized into national ones.

Gradually, victimhood in Trump’s rhetoric shifted from personal grievances and attacks on domestic elites to something broader and more far-reaching. According to Patrona’s analysis, this narrative became increasingly nationalized and externalized. Rather than focusing solely on his own legal troubles or partisan opponents, Trump began portraying the United States itself as a victim of foreign aggression. In this version of events, other countries were villains responsible for plundering American industry, exploiting trade imbalances, and sending criminals across the border.

In essence, Trump wasn’t just playing the victim card for himself; he tried to bring the entire US into it.

He told a crowd in Davos: “The EU treats us very, very unfairly, very badly… hundreds of billions of dollars of deficits with the EU… we’re gonna do something about it.” These weren’t just random complaints. Patrona notes that such statements qualify as commissive speech acts—language that commits the speaker to a future course of action.

In other words, Trump didn’t just say the U.S. had been wronged. He promised vengeance.

A Populist Trick

Patrona distills Trump’s second-term rhetoric into a formula of two elements: inflicted pain and retribution.

The formula follows a clear structure. First, he portrays the US as a long-abused victim. Then, he names and shames the source of the pain, whether Canada, Mexico, or the European Union. Finally, Trump announces consequences: tariffs, bans, or threats of disengagement.

During a 2025 press briefing, for instance, he accused Canada of abusing U.S. banks, Mexico of flooding the country with migrants, and the EU of refusing to buy American goods. “Something’s gonna happen there,” he warned. “We’re not gonna allow that.”

In one rally speech following an assassination attempt, Trump declared: “Last week I took a bullet for democracy,” casting himself as a literal martyr for the nation. These are stories designed to justify payback, and it seems to be working.

Patrona argues that leaders use victimhood as a strategic tool to frame moral hierarchies. By painting others (foreign governments, the media, political opponents) as aggressors, Trump positions himself and the American people as righteous victims. That framing invites emotional responses: empathy for the in-group, and outrage toward the perceived villains.

It’s an old populist trick, but one that has been refitted for the modern media landscape. “Trump’s claims to victimhood are articulated in tandem with and allow him to perform a set of fundamental rhetorical moves… ultimately, to accrue political leverage,” Patrona explains. “[It] allows Trump to rhetorically optimize his positive self-presentation as a God-sent martyr and savior,” while giving moral license for policies that might otherwise seem extreme.

In this framing, trade imbalances are moral injuries and tariffs becomes acts of justice and vengeance.

From Martyr to Savior

In her study, Patrona notes how Trump routinely blurs the line between personal and national suffering. He is both victim and avenger. At campaign rallies, he recalls being shot at. In the next breath, he condemns foreign governments for taking American jobs.

In a Las Vegas rally, he recounted a conversation with a waitress struggling with taxes on her tips. “Waitresses and caddies and drivers… they make money, let them keep their money,” he said. In another, he claimed foreign nations were “emptying out their insane asylums” into the U.S., describing an “invasion” that his administration would repel.

By invoking both working-class hardship and national injury, Trump casts himself as the only one willing to fight back.

“This blending of personal and national victimhood allowed Trump to present himself as both a survivor and a savior,” Patrona writes. “Someone who not only endured injustice but would also avenge it on behalf of the country”.

This approach has major consequences both for the US and the rest of the world.

On April 2, 2025, Trump signed a sweeping executive order imposing “reciprocal tariffs” on nearly every major trading partner. He called it “Liberation Day.” He keeps using brutal rhetoric and the pretense of victimhood to justify actions against other countries as well as US citizens.

For decades, the US led the charge for free trade. Under Trump’s second term, that chapter may be ending with a story of pain and revenge. And this is probably just the beginning. As Patrona concludes: “Authoritarian victimhood rhetoric is far from innocuous… it both anticipates and puts to work anti-democratic, coercive, and illiberal governance and policies”.