In the aftermath of the 2016 US presidential campaign, pundits, policy analysts and scholars recoiled in dismay when, despite widespread news coverage exposing differences between the two candidates, the one widely regarded as the most qualified lost to the one regarded as the least qualified. Appeals to ward off attacks on time-honoured democratic institutions went unheeded. The mainstream media was impotent in swaying public opinion to reject repeated vows from the Republican candidate to derail the status quo with egregious abuses of power. Unprecedented chaos followed him into the White House. Coverage of ‘the truth’ no longer seemed relevant. His outrageous tweets actually helped to get him elected. Meanwhile, international anxiety and uncertainly over the threat of populist, political contagion grows. The power of language has never been sufficiently acknowledged in cultural policy. The vitriol and divisiveness throughout the campaign in which the idiom of threat and vengeance ignited a popular thirst for the Democratic candidate to be jailed or even killed has been gathering force on the airwaves for decades. It was normalized with the rise of shock jock radio talk show hosts, transferred to television and reinforced with violence creep in media entertainment. Social media has accelerated the process with widespread dissemination of every tweet and falsehood. The challenge ahead is to beat back this tide and reclaim public discourse on the basis of morals and values consistent with best practices in democratic governance.