THE WOMEN WHO BROUGHT DOWN TRUMP

Donald Trump may have been defeated by a man (Joe Biden) but history will remember that it was women (not men) who decided the winner of America’s 2020 Presidential elections.

The majority of men (52%) elected for Trump in 2016 but were indecisive this time.

“Men split almost exactly evenly between Biden and Trump, which is shocking,” said Kathy Dolan, a political scientist at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, who studies gender in politics.

Overall, 49% of men of all races supported Trump, while 48% voted for Biden this year.

On November 3rd 2020, 56% of Women supported Biden against 43% for Trump. While there is no doubt that it was the overall women’s vote that propelled Biden to the top, qualitative profiling of the female electorate reveals a disconcerting fact: Tribal loyalty (which I mentioned in my previous article) prevailed.

White women still stood by Trump despite all his vulgarities, mismanagement of the coronavirus crisis and blatant racism. CNN exit polls show that the majority of White Women (about 51%) still voted for Trump. 

Women as a group may have repudiated Trump but it was particularly the collective force of African-American women, Latinas and Asian-American women that finally crushed him.

“It was particularly the collective force of coloured women that finally crushed him.” 

These are the seven women that took exceptional actions to bring him down:

FOUR YOUNG WOMEN UNDER 40: TAMIKA MALLORY, BOB BLAND, CARMEN PEREZ AND LINDA SARSOUR

Shocked by the unexpected victory of Donald Trump and what it meant for women’s rights, four extraordinary young women activists: Tamika Mallory, Mari Lynn Foulger (Bob Bland), Carmen Perez and Linda Sarsour, took things into their own hands.

Literally the day after Trump’s inauguration, they pulled more than a million people into Washington DC to protest. They led the Women’s March on 21st January 2017.

It attracted 3,300,000–5,600,000 people nationwide and was then the single largest protest-day in American history. It was a warning shot to the newly elected President who, during the campaign, was caught bragging (in the now infamous leaked-tape) about grabbing women by their p**** and encouraged his supporters to taunt Hilary Clinton with “Lock Her Up” Chants. 

Image: (From left): Tamika Mallory, Mari Lynn Foulger (Bob Bland), Carmen Perez and Linda Sarsour.

Street protests organized by Mallory, Bland, Perez and Sarsour were described by New York US Senator, Kristen Gilibran, as “the most inspiring and transformational moment I’ve ever witnessed in politics”.

Trump took notice because his inauguration crowd size was no match for the attendance numbers of the Women's March.

Their initiative propelled them to TIME MAGAZINE'S LIST OF 100 MOST INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE in 2017 and motivated women across America to turn their anger into real electoral actions.

Two years later in 2018, a record number of ordinary women from all backgrounds who had never run for office were catapulted to the USA congress.

The most prominent amongst them were : Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York (Youngest woman to serve in the US Congress), Ilhan Omar of Minnesota (First Muslim immigrant to the US congress), Ayanna Pressley (African American from Massachusetts), Rashida Tlaib of Michigan (First woman of Palestinian heritage in the congress) and Katie Porter ( A single mother of three from California).

These women used their congressional platform to be a thorn on the side of Donald Trump during his last two years. Their social media engagements mobilized young voters as they pushed for legislation that kept the Trump Administration in check.

NANCY PELOSI

At 80 years Old, she is the only woman in U.S. history to serve as Speaker. she is the 2nd in line (After the Vice President) to succeed the President. Described by Chris Cillizza (CNN) as the “the most powerful female member of the Congress ever”.

Pelosi a brilliant strategist and commands respect. Even Trump finds it hard to stick a silly nickname on her. Democrats love and fear her at the same time. Republicans do not want to cross her.

Mark Meadows, Trump’s current Chief of Staff told the New York Times in 2019 that “She is a skilled adversary and a master at keeping all Democrats in line”.

The biggest political punch that Nancy Pelosi delivered to Trump was The Impeachment.

She is the one who masterfully and meticulously built broad support amongst her fellow democrats and the general public to impeach Trump. That’s probably why her daughter, Alexandra Pelosi, said this of her mom:

“She will cut your head off and you won’t even know you’re bleeding”.

The impeachment trial she orchestrated gave Democrats an opportunity to publicly shame Trump and damage him politically. She knew full well that Trump would survive in the Republican-controlled Senate.

Image: Pelosi rips up Trump's speech (Credit: The Guardian)

Nonetheless she went ahead anyway in order to serve red meat to angry Democrats who felt that Trump had gotten away with too many crimes. They badly wanted Trump punished.

The impeachment trial will remain an unremovable stain in the legacy of Trump’s Presidency. It weakened Trump significantly amongst independents. His acquittal in the Senate was described by observers as a sham. Even Mitt Romney, Republican Senator from Utah voted to convict Trump. Nancy Pelosi’s action unified Democrats, exposed Republicans’ hypocrisy and turned a good number of independents against Trump.

LETITIA JAMES

Of all the women who brought down Trump, Letitia James is the one that should terrify him the most.

She was elected Attorney General of New York State in the wave elections of 2018.She is the first African-American and first woman to be elected to the position. As soon as she became the top prosecutor of New York State, she went after the NRA (National Rifle Association).

Image: Leticia James (Credit: Spectrum News)

For good measure, the NRA is not just a gun lobby organization. It’s a powerful political force that is fully aligned with the Republican Party. They backed Trump in 2016, donated $30 million to his campaign and spent overall close to $70 million on advertising and voter mobilization drives for Republicans.

On August 6, 2020, James officially filed a lawsuit to dissolve the NRA after investigating the organization for more than a year. The lawsuit claimed that senior leadership was corrupt illegally using the NRA's charitable finances for personal use.

By attacking NRA, Letitia James crippled their wings, dried up their source of funding and kept them busy fighting in court.

They could no longer help Trump.

This deprived Trump of a valuable cash cow as well as campaign manpower (for the NRA facing the Financial Crisis, it started laying off staff).

James isn’t finished with Trump just yet. The biggest blow she could deliver to Trump might come after the elections. Boosted by her success with NRA, James set her sights on Trump’s Business and Family.

Where everybody failed, she succeeded in getting Trump tax records. For four years, Trump with his army of lawyers had managed to prevent anyone (including the Congress) from getting their hands on his tax return.

Even the mighty Nancy Pelosi tried and failed several times to use her congressional powers to summon Trump Tax records. James launched an investigation into Trump’s own finances, sending subpoenas to Deutsche Bank, which has made loans to the president’s businesses.

Now Letitia James wants 2nd son (Eric Trump) to testify regarding Trump’s Organization Finances. Among the properties being specifically investigated by James’ office are the Trump International Hotel and Tower Chicago, the Trump National Golf Club in Los Angeles and many more.

Once Donald Trump leaves office, Letitia James might be the one to Lock Him Up.

STACY ABRAMS

Since 1992, The State of Georgia has not voted for a Democratic Party’s Presidential candidate. This year, most analysts predicted a close race but still expected Trump to win here (albeit narrowly).

On the night after the elections, Trump was leading in the State. After three days of vote counting with the most attention turned on Pennsylvania to deliver their 20 electoral votes to Biden and put him over the finish line, the biggest surprise came from Georgia.

Biden took the lead and maintained it. Today with his lead standing at more than 10,000 votes and counting, the state is headed to a recount. When the dust settles, Biden should be the first Democrat to win Georgia in almost 30 years. This historic achievement is widely credited to a 46 year old Stacey Yvonne Abrams.

Her fight to bring down Trump started in 2018 when she lost a hard-fought governor’s race in Georgia by just 55,000 votes. It was reported that her opponent, the sitting Republican governor had used the power of his office the remove about 200,000 voters (mostly African-Americans and Latinos) from the registration list.

Image: Stacey Abrams (Credit: The Boston Globe)

Abrams decided to look to the future and set up an organization called FAIR FIGHT with the goal to register new voters and rehabilitate the ones purged from the 2018’s list.

Two years later, just in time for the 2020 elections, Abrams and a group of organizations had successfully registered more than 800,000 voters in Georgia alone.

With her army of volunteers, she went vote-mining door to door across Georgia. Without her machine bringing hundreds of thousands of new voters to polling stations, Trump would have beaten Biden in Georgia.

She’s not only delivered 16 electoral votes to Biden, but she and her organization are on the ground sweating to deliver two Senate seats to Democrats during the run-off in January 2021. 

Abrams is considered by many observers as the most consequential woman for Democrats in 2020 elections.

She was on the VP Short-List along with prominent names as Senator Kamala Harris and Senator Elizabeth Warren. I expect this Charismatic young woman to be given an important portfolio in President Biden’s cabinet. 

The women who brought down Trump did not relentlessly pursue their endeavours only to become spectators to watch Biden run the show.

They will be front and center from now on. Biden may be the President but his policies will be carried out primarily by women. The first in line of succession in his administration, Vice-President Kamala Harris will also serve as the President of the US Senate. 

The most powerful person in the congress, Speaker Nancy Pelosi will hold the purse, hence deciding on all Government spending.

The presence of women in the Biden’s Administration will make the next four years so vastly different from the previous four years under Trump. 

These women will push for government-funded universal health care systems like those in most European countries.

Republicans might call it “socialism” but once the public gets a taste of free medical coverage, they won’t care what label is attached to it. 

The first lady of the United States, Dr Jill Biden is a college professor and a smart compassionate woman.

She, along with the Vice President and the House Speaker will be very reluctant to let Venezuelan & Iranian children starve to death under US-imposed economic sanctions while their nations sit on millions of barrels of Oil.

I suspect that they will push America to lift sanctions on Venezuela and Iran. They would want to normalize trade relations with China.

In the short-term, Petroleum Investors like myself will be annoyed with depressed Oil prices resulting from too much Iranian Crude Oil flooding the market. However, the world’s economy will benefit from stability and predictability.

However, it would be naïve to expect a US Administration controlled by women to suddenly end wars in the Middle East and Afghanistan or stop threatening China.

The National interest of a country dictates its global posture. I am suggesting that pro-war Republicans as well as proponents of US military interventions around the world will face stiff resistance from the White House. The middle-East peace talks between Israel & Palestine will be a priority. 

“Perhaps the biggest contribution of the women surrounding Biden would be to MAKE AMERICA HUMBLE AGAIN.” 

In 2015, Angela Merkel (Leader of Europe’s largest economy, Germany) rescued Greece and indeed Europe from economic collapse.

She did it without bragging and bloviating.

Will women help America humble up, stop scapegoating others (i.e. China) and save itself? Only time will tell.

Winston Churchill once said:

“You can always count on Americans to do the right thing-after they’ve tried everything else.”

AUTHOR: Baron Lamarre www.baronlamarre.com