Opinion: Should We Expect the Women in Trump’s Toxic Orbit to Know Better?
If you want a little insight into the status of women in the new Donald Trump regime, take a look at his inauguration. The ones with the good spots were there not because of their own accomplishment or influence, but largely because of their proximity to “important” men. Tech billionaires including Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos were given choice seats—ahead, even, of Trump’s cabinet picks. (You might call this a shadow cabinet, but shadows usually trail behind, obscured. These men seem perfectly happy to be out front.)
Trailing behind them were women who also seemed totally fine celebrating the swearing-in of a man who has boasted about grabbing women’s genitals, was held liable for sexual battery and bragged about getting Roe v. Wade overturned—and that’s not even getting started on his proposals to deport millions of immigrants, his policy of separating young children from their families at the border, his pardoning of nearly 1,600 convicted criminals who attempted to overturn the results of a free and fair election, and so much more.
Lauren Sanchez, the fiancée of Jeff Bezos, continued her tradition of wearing radically inappropriate outfits to momentous occasions, this time sporting a white lace bustier in the Capitol Rotunda; Priscilla Chan, the wife of Mark Zuckerberg, was reportedly seen genially chatting with Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, one of the Trump-appointed judges who helped to overturn Roe and end the era of legal abortion in the U.S.—a decision that has likely cost several women their lives, many more their health, and all of us our basic rights and dignity. Chan is a doctor who runs a family philanthropy “that’s on a mission to help build a more inclusive, just and healthy future for everyone”—except, apparently, pregnant women.
It’s not up to women to civilize terrible men, and blaming women for the bad acts or beliefs of their male partners is often grossly misogynist, premised as it is on the idea that they are somehow responsible for guiding the moral behavior of the men in their lives.
But women are responsible for their own behavior and choices. And showing up to the inauguration to celebrate Trump—a man whose rhetoric is abhorrent, whose mistreatment of women personally and politically is well-established, and whose past policies are cruel and proposed future ones crueler—is certainly a choice.
Yes, some women in the audience were perhaps less there to celebrate and more there out of custom—former First Ladies, members of Congress, and so on. But former First Lady Michelle Obama, notably, did not attend; if she didn’t have to be there, the wives of craven billionaires certainly didn’t. So then, these tech moguls’ plus-ones, the wives of the Trump men, and the Trump women themselves have all thrown their support behind this president out of their own desire and free will. They’ve bought in, even if it’s not “their” money they’re spending—and even if they secretly hope the check might bounce later.
Women, it turns out, may not actually be morally superior to men at all. As we slowly and unevenly creep closer to gender equality in the political and economic spheres, it seems women are proving just as capable as men in unflattering ways, too—in venality, in self-interest, in corruption, in a willingness to sell others out to our own benefit, in a willingness to sell oneself out as well. So what’s behind the submission? Perhaps the same thing that motivates the many men who abase themselves for Trump’s approval: A desire for provision. For protection. And above all, for power.
A larger share of female voters cast their ballots for Trump in 2024 than in 2020—a larger share than for any Republican candidate in two decades. Compared to 2016, support for Trump went slightly up among Black women, notably up among young women, and way up among Latinas (it stayed more or less the same among white women, who already supported Trump in much larger numbers than women of color).
It is worth wondering what these women’s lives are like, and where their self-worth lies, when they see a thrice-married philanderer and thin-skinned blowhard as strong and admirable. One also wonders how the men in these women’s orbits behave, and what these women believe to be within the realm of normal.
There are other women, though, who are not living under any man or culture’s oppressive thumb, who don’t appear to hold right-wing political views, who see Trump as exactly who he is—and who back him anyway. One suspects many of the Silicon Valley wives, along with many of the Silicon Valley men, fall into this category. They know he’s dangerous. They know he’s sexist.
It’s somewhere between pathetic and appalling, then, that women like Priscilla Chan and Usha Vance, both highly educated and at least once with their own aspirations independent of their husbands, choose to stand by their men even as those men bend the knee to Trump.
It’s hard to believe that Usha or Priscilla are MAGA true believers. But because they’re getting theirs—their seat at the table, their sense of importance affirmed—they’re willing to smile for the cameras. (Only Melania, apparently, gets to scowl.) Or perhaps they fear that refusing to participate might cost them, or their husbands. This is, after all, the promise and the threat of Trumpian corruption: He suggests he will use whatever tools he has to reward those who support him, and to punish those who don’t.
And still: Participation is a choice. Celebrating this man is a choice. Those who make that choice fall into a few categories: villains, cowards, cynics, enablers. Some are all of the above. Trump and his team may not support gender equality, and are certainly working to undermine much of the progress women have made. But the women of Trumpworld have their own perverse claim to equality: when it comes to putting raw self-interest over decency or dignity or democracy itself, they can do it just as well as any man.
