A Trump supporter dressed as the president in a Superman outfit attends the Jan. 6 rally against the election results before rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol.
Jose Luis Magana/AP
Jose Luis Magana/AP
In President Trump’s Jan. 6 speech ahead of the riot on Capitol Hill, there was a telling moment that was easy to miss amid his calls to “fight like hell.” It was when Trump went on a tangent about the Republican governor of Georgia, one of the states Trump is angry he did not win on Election Day.
“And I had Brian Kemp, who weighs 130 pounds,” Trump told the crowd. “He said he played offensive line in football. I’m trying to figure that out. I’m still trying to figure that out. He said that the other night: ‘I was an offensive lineman.’ I’m saying: ‘Really? That must have been a very small team.'”
The crowd laughed appreciatively.
For however random and rambling that may have seemed, it nevertheless fit into the speech perfectly: the president belittling an opponent as weak while portraying himself and his supporters as strong. Weakness, it turned out, was a major theme in that speech, with the president wielding it in particular against his fellow Republicans.
“We got to get rid of the weak congresspeople, the ones that aren’t any good, the Liz Cheneys of the world,” he said, calling out the House Republican Conference Chair who would ultimately, days later, vote for his impeachment. “We got to get rid of them.”
It has shown up everywhere in his political career from petty insults, referring to primary opponents as “lil’ Marco” and “low-energy Jeb,” to encouraging violence against protesters at his rallies.
That macho presidency culminated with a riot on Capitol Hill that left five dead. The crowd was not only overwhelmingly white, but majority-male, according to observers.
A “not totally unpredictable” riot
“The events at the Capitol, while they were dramatic and outrageous, they were not totally unpredictable,” said Jackson Katz, author and creator of the film The Man Card, about white male identity politics.
In his opinion, while race has been central to Trump’s political strategy, gender is also inextricable.
“What he’s been signaling is not just that he’s the white person who’s going to stand up for white civilization, if you will, but he’s a white man who’s tough, who doesn’t back down and who’s strong, who embodies a certain kind of masculine gravitas and strength,” Katz said.
Many Trump supporters’ rhetoric mirrors this. Before Trump even became president, some of his supporters in the so-called “alt-right” referred to Republicans whom they deemed insufficiently hardline as “cucks” and “cuckservatives.” That word is a portmanteau of “conservative” and “cuckold.”
Trump backers in Washington seemed to understand the types of masculine compliments Trump craved. When Trump was diagnosed with coronavirus, Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted: “President Trump won’t have to recover from COVID. COVID will have to recover from President Trump.”
President Trump won’t have to recover from COVID.
COVID will have to recover from President Trump. #MAGA
In fact, the days since the riot have provided still new evidence of Trump’s preoccupation with his gender. Former chief of staff John Kelly told a Des Moines audience that Trump can’t admit to mistakes because “his manhood is at issue here,” as The Des Moines Register‘s Donnelle Ellers reported.
In pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to help him overturn the results of the election, Trump reportedly resorted to a misogynistic vulgarity. “You can either go down in history as a patriot, or you can go down in history as a pussy,” Trump said according to the New York Times.
Masculine ideals predict Trump support
The strong link between performative masculinity and the Trump presidency is not just anecdotal. There is a growing body of scholarly evidence of the links between gender attitudes and Trump support: for example, in a newly published study from Terri Vescio and Nathaniel Schermerhorn at Penn State University.
“Our main finding was that people who endorse ‘hegemonic masculinity,’ or the idea that men should be powerful, high status, tough and nothing like women, the people who endorse these ideals were more likely to support Trump,” Vescio said. “And that was for men and women over and above gender, over and above political orientation, and regardless of level of education.”
Again, that was for men and women, meaning that it’s not surprising that women were among the rioters. In one widely shared video, Texan Jenny Cudd bragged about her part in the riots.
“We did break down [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi’s office door and somebody stole her gavel, and took a picture sitting in the chair flipping off the camera, and that was on Fox News,” she said.
The idealization of a particular type of masculinity has gone hand in hand with hostility to women. Research has also found a link between “hostile sexism” and Trump support. In addition, numerous reports since the Capitol Hill riot have cited misogynist language among the rioters toward women leaders like Pelosi and Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser.
One man, Richard Barnett of Arkansas, was photographed sitting at Pelosi’s desk and later bragged about stealing a piece of her mail.
“I wrote her a nasty note, put my feet up on her desk and scratched my balls,” he told the New York Times‘ Matthew Rosenberg.
Richard Barnett holds a piece of mail as he sits inside the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi after rioters breached the U.S. Capitol. He bragged about leaving a note containing a sexist slur for Pelosi.
Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images
Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images
Trump’s broad appeal to voters and the way that he emboldens right-wing extremists reflect broader global political trends, in the opinion of Soraya Chemaly, executive director of the Representation Project, a nonprofit that fights gender inequality.
“I think there’s a lot going on. I think that one thing is that there is a global tide of macho fascism and masculinist backlash against change,” she said. “And I think that what we saw in the rise of Trump was part of that tide.”
Trump benefited from and amped up existing political and cultural attitudes about gender, in short, meaning that as he leaves office, those ideas won’t go away. In addition, Chemaly stressed, attitudes about gender are tightly woven together with those about race, class and party.
For now, Trump and his team are trying to burnish his masculine image as he leaves office. This was highlighted when Fox News’ Bill Hemmer asked Trump campaign spokesman Hogan Gidley last week about Trump’s feelings in the fallout from the riot.
Fox News Anchor Bill Hemmer asks Trump National Press Secretary Hogan Gidley if the president feels emasculated from “the social media crackdown.” pic.twitter.com/lIirtRXWhN
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
