The Abuser-In-Chief

Our new ad "Verdict" and some notes on Trump's sexual abuse.

With the verdict in for a genuinely shocking amount of $88.3 million in E. Jean Carroll’s second defamation suit against Donald Trump, we want to remind America that the Republican nominee for President is a sexual abuser.

A rapist.

A man who committed an assault then defamed the victim.

There are millions of American women (and men, to be sure) who have suffered from a spectrum of sexual and physical abuse. If you don’t know someone who has been abused in your life, either count your blessings or theirs because it’s deeply rooted in American culture. Abusers rarely violate only once. They have a pattern, a suite of justifications ranging from atavistic to sophistic, and in far too many cases, they get away with it. So few are caught, fewer are punished, and fewer still pay a price.

Trump will now pay a price, and though he is a thoroughly honorless man, it will cost him financially, and I think if American women have anything to say about it, it will cost him at the ballot box.

I know that in this fallen era, some people think Trump’s history as a degenerate, an abuser, and a vile human now just part of the noise, but it isn’t. Some people believe the fictional sins of others outweigh the actual violence of Trump. 

They don’t.

Donald Trump committed sexual assault.

Put another name there, and if a court had twice determined it was true, how would you feel? If it was “John Smith” and he was someone you knew, you’d cut him out of your life. You'd pull them out if it was “Bob Brown” and he taught at your kid’s school. If it were “Ramon Hernandez,” a local candidate for office, you’d never vote for him.

If it were anyone other than Donald Trump, every American would be outraged. Horrified. Disgusted.

For all the posturing on the American right today about masculinity and men taking their role as family protectors and providers, the silence of these judgments against Trump put the lie to their preening. Their endless screeching about imaginary Pizzagate conspiracies of cannibal pedophile rings and forged versions of Jeffrey Epstein’s flight logs put the lie to their alleged manhood. It took a woman who waited 40 years to hold Donald Trump to account for sexual assault. 

But MAGA gave Donald Trump a get-out-of-jail-free card again the moment the verdict broke. This weekend, we heard Republicans pretending to “not know about the case” or suggesting, “We’ll let the voters decide. I don’t know the details.” “I didn’t know he was an adjudicated rapist” is the new “I don’t read his Tweets.”

Now you do, MAGA. Donald Trump committed sexual assault.

It needs saying.

It needs saying again, and again, and again.