By Hal Brown
The Wikipedia article “Cult of Personality” has the poster of Stalin as their primary illustration. The article makes no reference to Donald Trump and the cult that he led. It is a good general reference for the subject in general. The article begins with a description that fits what happened with Trump to a T (no pun intended) except in that we were were not a one party totalitarian state or authoritarian country.
A cult of personality, or cult of the leader,[1] arises when a country's regime – or, more rarely, an individual – uses the techniques of mass media, propaganda, the big lie, spectacle, the arts, patriotism, and government-organized demonstrations and rallies to create an idealized, heroic, and worshipful image of a leader, often through unquestioning flattery and praise. A cult of personality is similar to apotheosis (deification), except that it is established by modern social engineering techniques, usually by the state or the party in one-party states and dominant-party states. It is often seen in totalitarian or authoritarian countries.
If you search for “Trump cult” or “cult of Trump” you are redirected to the entry for Steve Hassan the author of The Cult of Trump: A Leading Cult Expert Explains How the President Uses Mind Control. Here’s a review from The Psychiatric Times of his book.
Wikipedia does have a long section on Trumpism. It begins:
Trumpism is a term for the political ideology, style of governance,[9] political movement and set of mechanisms for acquiring and keeping power that are associated with the former 45th United States president, Donald Trump, and his political base.[10][11] It is an American political variant of the far-right[12][13] and of the national-populistand neo-nationalist sentiment seen in multiple nations worldwide from the late 2010s to the early 2020s.[14] And has been applied to conservative-nationalist and national-populist movements in Western democracies.
This is the collage of photos they have as their primary illustration.