The (Ab)Use of Strauss: “Claremonsters” in Defense of Trump

Few conservative thinkers have undergone as many transformations in the heads and at the hands of supposed followers as has Leo Strauss. The rift between the so-called East Coast Straussians who promote the philosophic way of life and the West Coast Straussians who, inspired by Harry V. Jaffa, believe in the necessity of political activism. While this chasm has hardly been of interest to the public at large, it has recently gained more attention in the wake of the presidential election 2016. With the Claremont Institute as their intellectual home, West Coast Straussians have given voice to a strand of conservatism that is trying to translate Donald J. Trump’s politics into a theoretical framework or doctrine, “Trumpism.” The Claremont Review of Books, a publication usually only consulted by fellow West Coast Straussians, gained sudden notoriety with the publication of an essay on “The Flight 93 Election” by an originally anonymous author. That particular defense of Trumpism and call for conservative backing was later seconded by members of the Institute. Strauss and Trump – an odd, an impossible and even outrageous pairing. So how come that the self-proclaimed heirs of Strauss and Jaffa have become “the academic home” of Trumpism? How can they reconcile the teachings of Strauss and the intellectual elitism of Straussians with the buffoonery of the current President? In other words, will their philosophic credibility be sacrificed on the altar of politics? These are some of the questions this paper shall explore, focusing, among others, on the work and thought of Charles R. Kesler.