When the Trump administration announced a supposed link between Tylenol (acetaminophen) and autism, it followed a now-familiar pattern: declare a “truth” without evidence, demand that agencies and loyalists backfill the science, and use the chaos to advance a political narrative. It is the very opposite of leadership—and yet, for Trump, it’s the essence of his political method.
The Tylenol-autism claim was a textbook example. For decades, acetaminophen has been one of the most widely used and trusted over-the-counter medications in the world. The overwhelming scientific consensus is that there is no credible evidence tying it to autism. But the Trump administration floated the allegation as if it were settled fact, sending parents into panic and researchers scrambling to respond. The point was not accuracy. The point was theater—another scapegoat to focus public anxiety, another “enemy” to blame for a complex condition science is still working to fully understand.
This is not new. It is the playbook of authoritarian regimes. Dictators rarely win power by reasoned argument. They win it by flooding the public square with convenient falsehoods, naming culprits for society’s ills, and then demanding loyalty to the invented narrative. In Stalin’s Soviet Union, “wreckers” and “saboteurs” were blamed for failed harvests. In Nazi Germany, Jews and other minorities were scapegoated for economic decline. In Trump’s America, the scapegoats shift—migrants, Democrats, public health officials, a children’s pain reliever—but the tactic remains the same.
We have seen it over and over again.
January 6th: When his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in a violent attempt to overturn an election, Trump did not take responsibility. Instead, he claimed the rioters were actually Antifa infiltrators, a convenient fiction that allowed his base to see themselves not as insurrectionists but as victims of a shadowy conspiracy.
The death of Charlie Kirk: Rather than allowing an honest reckoning with the toxic environment that led to Kirk’s assassination, the administration rushed to brand it a “far-left plot.” Evidence was irrelevant; the narrative mattered more.
Jeffrey Epstein’s trafficking ring: Instead of acknowledging Epstein’s decades of bipartisan enablers, Trump insisted it was “the Democrat deep state” that propped him up, as if child exploitation were a partisan scheme rather than a monstrous crime demanding accountability.
COVID-19 vaccines: Even as scientific data overwhelmingly showed that vaccines save lives, Trump’s team promoted the notion that they were “killing children.” It was a grotesque lie, one that undermined public health and cost lives, but it played well to a base already primed to distrust science.
Each time, the administration followed the same formula:
- Announce a claim without evidence.
- Demand loyalty to the claim as a test of political allegiance.
- Watch opponents waste time and credibility trying to rebut nonsense.
This method is not just dishonest—it is dangerous. By repeatedly manufacturing crises and scapegoats, Trump erodes the very idea of objective truth. Citizens are left disoriented, unsure of what to believe, more likely to cling to the strongman who insists only he can be trusted. That’s the authoritarian spiral.
The Tylenol-autism claim may sound absurd on its face, but it’s important to see it for what it was: not a scientific argument but a political maneuver. Autism is a condition that already carries stigma and misunderstanding. To dangle a household medicine as its supposed cause, without evidence, is to exploit parents’ fears and redirect them away from pressing public health issues—like access to care, special education resources, or the real complexities of neurodevelopmental science. It’s distraction by pseudoscience.
And it works because fear is powerful. When a parent hears “Tylenol causes autism,” their rational brain shuts down. They don’t have the time or tools to comb through medical journals. They look for certainty, for someone who promises protection. Trump steps into that void—not with solutions, but with blame. Always blame.
That is why this pattern cannot be dismissed as just another Trumpian sideshow. It’s not harmless. It conditions a public to accept lies as truth, scapegoating as governance, and propaganda as policy. It builds the infrastructure for something far darker than politics-as-usual.
The Tylenol episode should be remembered not as a quirky headline but as a warning. When leaders announce conspiracy first and ask questions later, when they treat evidence as optional and fear as a tool, democracy itself is at risk. America has seen this script before—abroad, in regimes we swore we would never emulate.
We are now watching it play out at home.