With just a few weeks to go until the election, Donald Trump has tried to rewrite his record on women’s rights and pitch himself as a “protector” who will save women from fear and unhappiness. His case, however, is not only muddied by his long record of misogyny, but his ugly personal attacks on women.
In a lengthy, rambling speech in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday, the Republican presidential nominee once again insulted his Democratic opponent, calling Vice President Kamala Harris “horrible” and a “dummy.” He said he was told to restrain himself when criticizing Harris because “women won’t like it.”
“I said, ‘I don’t care,’” he added.
Trump also seemed to suggest that more women should support him because of what he claimed were gains he made in combating human trafficking — an issue he referred to as “mostly in women” — when he was in the White House. As president, the issue was one of Trump’s top priorities, but experts have said that his sweeping crackdown on immigration severely impeded the fight against human trafficking. Jean Bruggeman of Freedom Network USA, a coalition of anti-trafficking service providers and advocates, told Time magazine in 2020 that the Trump administration ultimately chose to “ignore the needs of survivors and to reward traffickers.”
Still, Trump insists he was good on the issue. “Four years ago we had the best border in our country’s history and that included human trafficking, mostly in women, by the way,” he said. “So when women say, ‘Oh, I don’t know if I like Trump,’ I was the one — that is the most heinous thing. Human trafficking, mostly in women, gee, I wonder what that’s all about, right?”
Underneath Trump’s rambling comments lies his approach to appealing to specific demographics: Trump is often quick to claim that he will champion a group’s causes and address their concerns, and then in the same breath disparage them for not supporting him more. He has used similar language when speaking to Jewish Americans, telling them he will be “your defender, your protector,” while saying that Jewish people “will have a lot to do with it” if he loses the election.
Trump has also leaned on the threat of imagined violence to win over women, a tactic he has resorted to for years. Just last week, while attempting to stoke anti-immigration fear, Trump claimed without any evidence that people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border “grab young girls and slice them up right in front of their parents.”
