IF DONALD Trump was trying to scaremonger this past week, then boy did it work. People are growing more and more worried in the US - distrusting, anxious, concerned.

The problem for him, though, is that those most afraid are likely to be wearing Republican pin badges.

Many are fearful that he may already have lost them the White House. But that’s not where their real consternation lies.

It’s that he might just humiliate and split the party in doing so, as he gets ready for the biggest stage of his life.

Three presidential debates are fast approaching, pitting him head to head against battle ready Democrat Hillary Clinton, as election day on November 8 bears down.

Republicans roll their eyes and admit they have no idea what he might say, or do, next.

To quote the West Wing: “Ginger, get the popcorn.”

Even veteran Godfather actor Robert de Niro demanded American voters show the political system some respect, yesterday branding Trump “totally nuts” while speaking at a film festival in Sarajevo.

It was an easy target. An offer to a question he couldn’t refuse. After all, Trump has only helped fuel such observations in a five days littered with delusion.

Take Thursday, when he said he was open to trying Americans suspected of terrorism at the Guantanamo Bay detention centre in Cuba.

He said he did not like that President Obama wanted to try them in traditional courts rather than military commissions at Guantanamo Bay.

“I would say they could be tried there,” Trump said. “That’ll be fine.”

Who needs a criminal justice system, right?

Only 24 hours later well-known US radio host Hugh Hewitt almost choked on his microphone when interviewing the political debutant who claimed live on air that outgoing president Barack Obama had somehow “founded” Islamic State (IS).

“With his bad policies, that’s why Isis came about. If he would have done things properly. You wouldn’t have had Isis. Therefore, he was the founder of Isis,” Trump reiterated when offered the chance to roll back his comments.

You could probably forgive the few seconds of dead air that followed as the interviewer rocked on his chair.

Trump later tweeted: “THEY DON'T GET SARCASM?”

No, maybe not. Nor subtlety, it would seem.

At least not in his denials that by invoking the constitutional right for Americans to bear arms, he was apparently calling for followers to take out his rival Clinton.

“If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks - although the second amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know. But I tell you what, that will be a horrible day,” he said in the full glare of the world’s media.

It might have played to the gun lobby in his head, but to the real world it was an incitement to violence. He denied it. He always denies it, it’s part of his mojo.

But even the likes of House speaker and strong Trump supporter Paul Ryan stumbled to make light of the remark. If support within his party had frayed, that saw the veil of unity suddenly begin to rip at the seam.

And he seems to know it. Suddenly, the dime has finally dropped. He might be losing.

He conceded as much to a gathering of evangelical ministers in Florida that he was “having a tremendous problem in Utah” hinting that could hurt his plans to force through legislation as he sees fit.

It was a rare act of humility for a man who saw off 16 fellow Republicans for the nomination and vowed to “win big” for a nervous and fidgety convention.

Yet as Clinton ducks and dives jabs over email indiscretions and political misjudgements she is the one scoring big in the polls as he falls behind. If you read between the numerical lines, it appears Republicans themselves have had enough.

In traditionally Republican states, like Arizona and Georgia, party officials are concerned that Trump’s growing unpopularity could give Democrats an improbable victory.

Asked how he planned to reverse her advantage, Trump said he would do “the same thing I’m doing right now”.

“At the end, it’s either going to work, or I’m going to, you know, I’m going to have a very, very nice, long vacation,” he told CNBC, an unguarded admission that maybe he isn’t a dead cert for commander in chief after all.

But with no TV spending to speak off against wall to wall Democrat ads across the country, there is sense of calm before the storm. Like he has one ace left up his sleeve.

That actually, he never wants this dysfunctional ride to end.

He spent much of this weekend laying the groundwork for what is already shaping up to be a long, drawn out and expensive legal battle in the event he doesn’t win first time around.

And he’s fired the first shots already.

He declared there was only one way he could lose the crunch state of Pennsylvania - if he was cheated out of it.

His campaign website calls on volunteers to become so-called Trump Election Observers under the banner: “Help me stop crooked Hillary from rigging this election.”

Trump told a rally at Altoona: “We’re going to watch Pennsylvania. Go down to certain areas and watch and study and make sure other people don’t come in and vote five times.

“If you do that, we’re not going to lose.

“The only way we can lose, in my opinion - I really mean this, Pennsylvania - is if cheating goes on.”

Americans will soon have to ask themselves if that really is the worst thing that could happen.