DONALD TRUMP’S RESPONSES TOWARDS RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN THE 2016 U.S. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION (2016-2020)

Abstract

The study entitled Donald Trump’s Responses Towards Russian Interference in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election by Halimah Dewi Irawan under the advisory of Drs. Teuku Rezasyah, M.A., Ph.D. analyzes the case of Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election through its social media campaign as well as hacking-and-dumping operations which supported Donald Trump and disparaged Hillary Clinton to further Russia’s interest in undermining American led liberal democracy and in the result, further strained U.S.-Russia relations. Revelations of this fact resulted in the questioning of Donald Trump’s legitimacy as President of the U.S. In determining the responses towards this occurrence, this study utilizes the poliheuristic theory and idiosyncratic analysis in analyzing Donald Trump’s decision-making process. From this analysis, both irrational factors such as Donald Trump’s idiosyncrasies and rational factors such as analysis of the domestic political, international political, and economic dimensions are taken into account in Donald Trump’s decision-making process in which Donald Trump’s domestic political survival is the non-compensatory variable in determining the unilateral, bilateral, regional, and international responses from 2016 to 2020.