Most politicians ask themselves what women want. American women vote more than men. Issues that affect our lives are routinely dismissed as “women’s issues,” even though we make up more than half of the population. Both parties, but Republicans have a far more male-dominated problem than Democrats. There has never been a female president.
So what do women want? Last week, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump attempted to answer that question when he spoke with Fox News host Harris Faulkner to a women-only audience during a town hall event that aired Wednesday. Trump’s answer to the age-old question? The bizarre ramblings about safety, the nonsensical talking points about reproductive rights, the promises of the powerful to just work things out, the democratic process is to be condemned. But what was clear was how Trump and his team approached women. That is, as dependents in need of protection, and as a special interest group with no particular interest in anything other than the fact that they needed women to win.
If you’ve ever watched a Trump debate or a Trump rally, Trump’s remarks at Faulkner Focus will come as little surprise. The gist of his story is well established, even if it comes out in a gibberish storyline and has little to do with reality. He had the best boundaries. Biden’s border was the worst. He had the highest economic power. Biden’s economy was terrible. This time he added some new things. He had the best child tax credit, but it was largely his daughter’s idea, and Biden turned it into the worst tax credit, he said. (In fact, Joe Biden expanded the child tax credit. Then Republicans, with support from Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, refused to renew it. And this summer, Senate Republicans passed a bill to expand it. ) Trump’s Republican Party is also the best. Trump is better than Democrats when it comes to IVF, he said, and in fact, he made the ridiculous claim on three separate occasions that Trump is the “father of IVF.”
Regardless of how disgusting and stomach-churning it is to hear these words from Trump’s mouth, the claim that Republicans are superior at IVF couldn’t be more false. Republicans oppose Democratic efforts to protect in vitro fertilization nationwide and have proposed a bill to ban it nationwide. But it’s clear that President Trump knows how bad the Republican Party is on this issue. And after the Alabama Supreme Court made it effectively illegal in the state earlier this year, President Trump credits Alabama’s “wonderful and charming” Sen. Katie Britt for teaching him that.
How he learned what IVF is this year and still became an IVF father remained a mystery. But this Big Daddy attitude was his central theme.
It was clear from the start that the Trump campaign was telling him to focus on safety—the pro-Trump women in the audience (and nearly all of them were Trump supporters) were wondering how Trump was treating them. I wanted to know if he would protect me like that. Faulkner complained about Democrats’ “preamble” at town hall, playing a video of Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock telling voters to get out and vote because Trump is a threat to democracy. and started a conversation. In response, President Trump boasted of support from the Border Patrol and the Fraternal Order of Police (which are by no means a predominantly female organization) and continued, “When we talk about safety…” (Mr. Faulkner did not talk about safety. do not have). But Trump wanted to talk about safety, and more specifically, telling women in suburban Georgia that they are in danger from illegal immigrants and criminals, and that only Trump can save them. I wanted to convince her.
Jill Filipovich
I was completely defeated by the way the media reported on Trump and Harris.
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President Trump also played defender when asked about the child tax credit, which has become much less generous thanks in large part to Republicans. Always careful to maintain a macho demeanor, the former president actually took credit for someone else’s work just once — when his daughter Ivanka implored him to do something to help a family in need. He said he didn’t really want to work on the issue, but well, his daughter had asked for it and Daddy wasn’t going to say no.
The same theme appeared in President Trump’s response to a question about transgender girls in sports. President Trump said the solution is simply to ban it. Faulkner asked how that would prevent transgender women from playing sports. President Trump said he would just ban it. That’s it. After all, he will be president. Just ban it.
The audience cheered.
In fact, we learned something from Kamala Harris’ interview on Fox News: There’s a very wrong lesson to be taken from Kamala Harris’ performance among Black and Latino voters: Kamala’s recent media blitz There’s a clear target for OK, okay. Let’s talk about the Texas Senate race.
On the campaign trail, Kamala Harris has rightly emphasized the threat Trump poses to democracy (Trump said at this town hall that the real threat to democracy is actually Democrats). And many voters certainly believe that democracy is worth protecting and that President Trump is putting it at risk. But for Trump supporters, his authoritarian tendencies are part of the appeal. He has no intention of interfering with the separation of powers or the slow democratic legislative process. He’s going to be president – if he doesn’t like something, he’s going to ban it. His supporters love it, as do the women of Fox viewers. And if the women are nice to daddy, daddy might also consider their problems.
Women make up more than half of the population. We don’t all want one thing. I think the right to bodily autonomy is different when our lives and health are threatened by circumstances beyond our control. President Trump’s pitch to women is that they don’t need autonomy. They can just trust a man who promises to bend the country to their advantage, even if it means destroying the country in the end.
