After the EU referendum, a curious thing happened. The winners were neither happy, nor triumphant. The victory announcement by Boris Johnson was funereal, almost resentful. It was almost as though the campaigners had practised and perfected their “outsiders against the establishment” lines during the campaign, and once on the winning side had no script.

Trump claims 'millions voted illegally' but offers no evidence Read more

Sure enough, once the shock of the result dissipated, the sharp tone of the leave campaign returned to fill the vacuum. Any issues with Brexit were the fault of those who voted remain: they were “talking Britain down”, as if the pound’s depreciation were more sensitive to the chatter of negative remainers than to the seismic shock of a vote to leave the largest economic union on earth. Having gone through a polarising referendum and secured an unlikely victory, those on the winning side are still angry, angrier even than they were before.

The same bizarre sore-winner phenomenon is happening in the US after one of the most stunning victories in election history. Donald Trump is so vexed that, in response to calls for a recount in some states, he tweeted that the only reason he did not win the popular vote is because of illegal voting. Even in victory, even when he is the actual president-elect of the United States, he believes that he has been robbed. It is almost like he wanted to lose.

Similar to the petulant chippy vibe of the Brexit victory, the Trump triumph is peevish and cantankerous, seizing on any opportunity to reclaim the credentials of the besieged that propelled him to victory. But you see, in a way, he has been robbed. As Brexiters have been. They have been robbed of the ability to blame everything on others and not be accountable. They have been robbed of the virtue of the victim and the helpless underdog.

People say that Trump’s worst fear is to lose, or to be seen as a loser. It looks like it is in fact the opposite. Trump, and indeed some Brexit voters, are far more upset by their victory than they ever would have been if they had lost. “Triggered by winning” it has been called. That was never the deal. They are angry at the losing side for letting them win.

Brexieters are kicking the corpses of the vanquished – and then running away screaming

The charitable way to view this is fear and covetousness over hard-won gains. Perhaps these victories were so unexpected that their owners are terrified that the world will forcibly revert somehow and re-establish the dominance of interests that they believe conspires against them. But it is more likely a more ignoble combination of populism and panic. The forces that gave Brexit and Trump momentum coalesced around grievance rather than vision. There was no agenda, no genuinely thought-out project that the winners could soberly set about executing, just resentment. And the grievance narrative must be continued even in success because that is pretty much the whole energising principle.

That’s why potential recounts in the US and the UK court ruling to award parliament the right to opine on triggering article 50 are seen not as democratic processes, but proof that the powers that were are on the move. The politicians now in charge must distract voters by attributing their failures to sabotage. Those supporters who were animated by populist desires and prejudices, rather than rational argument, will inevitably continue to view the world through that prism and therefore welcome the diversions with relish, locked in a battle with an opposing side that has been defeated and is inanimate.

Matthew Parris describes Brexiters obsessed with extending their fight against the vanquished side even after the battle is won as victorious troops still stalking the battlefield, kicking the corpses of the dead. Actually it’s more disturbing – the victors are kicking the corpses and then running away screaming because the cadavers have moved.