Here’s a news story about a guy who, in the face of his own family’s need and the scrutiny of mainstream news platforms, cannot conceive that a conman has fleeced him of more than $30,000. The story makes it clear that he’s aware of his gut, which is screaming at him that he’s been victimized. Nevertheless, he seems constitutionally incapable of identifying the source of his victimization. It cannot be that MAGA leaders abused him and duped him into investing his family’s savings into a pump-and-dump crypto scheme. No, it’s the Democrats who have victimized him in some way that he can’t quite articulate.

When I read this, I immediately thought of Dietrich Bonhoeffer‘s anti-Nazi observations on stupidity, published before the Nazi’s murdered him in their death camps.

He noted that stupidity is a psychosocial condition, and is not a natural condition of their cognitive faculties. In other words, people are made to be stupid:

The impression one gains is not so much that stupidity is a congenital defect, but that, under certain circumstances, people are made stupid or that they allow this to happen to them. We note further that people who have isolated themselves from others or who live in solitude manifest this defect less frequently than individuals or groups of people inclined or condemned to sociability. And so it would seem that stupidity is perhaps less a psychological than a sociological problem. It is a particular form of the impact of historical circumstances on human beings, a psychological concomitant of certain external conditions. Upon closer observation, it becomes apparent that every strong upsurge of power in the public sphere, be it of a political or of a religious nature, infects a large part of humankind with stupidity. It would even seem that this is virtually a sociological-psychological law. The power of the one needs the stupidity of the other. The process at work here is not that particular human capacities, for instance, the intellect, suddenly atrophy or fail. Instead, it seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence, and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances. The fact that the stupid person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent. In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with a person, but with slogans, catchwords and the like, that have taken possession of him. He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being. Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings. – Dietrich Bonhoeffer, On Stupidity, 1942

In a sense, it is frightening to see the minds of so many, so abused by the “Epstein Class‘” media machine that they have become twisted into mechanized automatons, limited to mere algorithm-driven, Pavlovian bootlicking responses.

The horror of it all is that the victimization MAGA feels is very real to them because it is real. MAGA brains really have been abused. They really have been harmed. Moreover, they’ve been abused in such a way that many of them seemingly lack the capacity to grasp who is harming them, even as they live with the experience of it every day. They’re simply too abused to conceive of who their abusers are.

The very real pain they experience cannot be caused by the people running pump-and-dump scams. It simply cannot be that a family, infamous for scamming people for decades, has scammed them.

Speaking of conmen and scams, here is a list of some of the scams Trump has run on those who cannot grasp that he is a confidence man:

• Trump University / Trump Entrepreneur Initiative. A for-profit real-estate seminar operation marketed as teaching Trump’s “secrets.” Former students and the New York attorney general alleged false advertising, fake “university” branding, aggressive upsells, and expensive programs that failed to deliver on their promises. Trump settled three cases for $25 million; there was no admission of wrongdoing, but class members recovered roughly 80–90% of payments.
• Donald J. Trump Foundation. A New York court-ordered resolution required Trump to pay $2 million for illegally misusing charitable funds for political purposes; the foundation was shut down, and Trump admitted to the misuse of foundation funds.
• New York civil business-fraud. Trump, the Trump Organization, and two of his children were found liable in New York for fraud involving financial statements. In 2025, the appellate court affirmed fraud liability and injunctive relief but vacated the disgorgement awards, with the New York attorney general stating she would seek further appeal.
• Trump Organization criminal tax-fraud scheme. The Trump Corporation and Trump Payroll Corp. were convicted on all counts for a 13-year scheme to defraud, conspiracy, criminal tax fraud, and falsifying business records. Trump himself was not charged in that case, but the entities convicted were his companies.
• Hush-money / falsified business-records scheme. Trump was personally convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying New York business records to conceal conduct tied to the 2016 election. This is not a consumer scam like Trump University, but it is a court-proven fraudulent recordkeeping scheme.
• Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts false earnings. The SEC found that Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts issued a materially misleading 1999 earnings release by concealing a $17.2 million one-time gain, making the company appear to beat expectations. The company settled through a cease-and-desist order without admitting or denying the findings.
• Trump money-laundering violations. The Trump-branded Taj Mahal casino admitted willful Bank Secrecy Act violations and paid a $10 million FinCEN penalty in 2015; FinCEN also noted a prior 1998 penalty. This is regulatory misconduct rather than a consumer scam, and by 2015 Trump’s direct control was limited, but it belongs in the broader record of Trump-branded financial misconduct.
• Trump Tower Polish-worker case. The construction of Trump Tower involved undocumented Polish demolition workers working off the books, underpaid, and in unsafe conditions. Litigation over union benefit obligations eventually settled for $1.375 million, after years of litigation.
• Trump inaugural self-dealing. The D.C. attorney general alleged that Trump’s 2017 inaugural committee misused nonprofit funds by overpaying Trump’s hotel, funding a private party for Trump’s adult children, and paying a private Trump Organization debt. The Trump Organization and inaugural committee agreed to pay $750,000 to resolve the allegations.
• Trump SoHo condo-hotel lies. Early buyers alleged they were misled about how many units had been sold. Trump and co-defendants settled the civil case, refunding 90% of $3.16 million in deposits while admitting no wrongdoing.
• Trump Ocean Resort Baja Mexico. Buyers alleged they were misled into believing Trump was a developer rather than primarily a licensor of his name. More than 100 would-be buyers sued after the project failed; Trump settled confidentially, while developers agreed to pay at least $7.25 million and denied wrongdoing.
• Trump International Hotel & Tower Fort Lauderdale. Buyers similarly alleged Trump’s role in the project was misrepresented. Trump won one lawsuit and settled two others without admitting wrongdoing.
• ACN multi-level-marketing promotions. Plaintiffs alleged Trump and his family promoted ACN as a promising business opportunity while concealing large payments from ACN and misleading financially vulnerable people about likely success. The Second Circuit description is explicit that these were allegations, not merits findings.
• The Trump Network supplement MLM. Trump licensed his name and promoted a multi-level-marketing supplement venture that sold customized vitamins and urine-testing kits. STAT found the health claims were not supported by modern medicine, and CBS reported that many participants lost money after buying into the “recession-proof” pitch.
• Trump Mortgage. A short-lived Trump-branded mortgage company launched near the peak of the housing bubble. Its CEO exaggerated credentials, the company collapsed, and an unpaid-commission judgment was reported against Trump Mortgage. Trump characterized his role as name licensing rather than ownership.
• Unpaid contractors and vendors. A USA Today-derived review found dozens of lawsuits and hundreds of liens filed by contractors, workers, and vendors alleging that Trump entities failed to pay them.
• Post-2020 “Election Defense Fund” / “Stop the Steal” fundraising. The January 6 Committee concluded that Trump and the RNC raised more than $250 million from supporters using false election-fraud claims and representations that money would fight the election result, while much of it was not used that way. This is an official congressional finding, not a criminal conviction.
• 2020 recurring-donation “dark pattern” fundraising. Trump’s campaign and Republican fundraising infrastructure used pre-checked boxes and confusing donation forms that steered supporters into recurring donations; reports found very large refunds, including $122.7 million by the Trump campaign in 2020. This is a documented pattern of deceptive fundraising, though not a final fraud judgment against Trump personally.
• Truth Social disclosure fraud. The SEC charged Digital World Acquisition Corp., the SPAC formed to take Trump Media public, with violating antifraud provisions by misleading investors about merger discussions with Trump Media before its IPO. DWAC settled with an $18 million penalty condition tied to the merger. This was against the SPAC, not Trump personally.
• Trump crypto ventures: $TRUMP memecoin and World Liberty Financial. As of 2026, Reuters and AP reported that Trump earned enormous sums from crypto-linked ventures while investors in some Trump-linked tokens suffered heavy losses. AP also reported that Trump hosted top memecoin holders at a private dinner, raising conflict-of-interest concerns. This is current, large-scale self-enrichment and investor-risk conduct; as of July 3, 2026, it should be classified as an unresolved grift/conflict scandal rather than court-proven fraud.
• Trump NFTs. Trump-branded NFT trading cards sold access-style perks and collectibles tied to Trump’s image. They are commonly criticized as fan monetization or grift, but I would not put them in the same legal category as Trump University or the Foundation unless a specific deceptive claim is proven.
• America250 donation-diversions. Trump-linked fundraisers misled donors who intended to support the bipartisan America250 celebration and diverted money to the Trump-backed Freedom 250 effort; Freedom 250 denied the allegations.

For someone trapped in a MAGA mindset, they might look at the above pattern and only see a good man who has been treated wrongly by the very people and systems they themselves blame for their troubles. Unfortunately, recovery from stupidity is a long and hard process.

Recovery means reducing coercive group pressure, making accuracy a valued norm, preserving dissent, inoculating people against propaganda tactics, humanizing outgroups, and creating deliberative institutions that allow people to reconsider their beliefs without humiliation or exile. Recovery isn’t a brief intervention, and it’s not mere exposure to facts; recovery from the stupidity that’s not only ruining the lives of marks like the man in this story, but also putting the whole of our nation at risk, is a significant protective psychosocial framework that consistently attends to their vulnerable state.

While facts still matter, they work best after the person has enough psychosocial freedom to recognize them.