Donald Trump, Cross-Dresser?

Many people will have read of the allegations of sexual abuse by Donald Trump, the account that advice columnist E. Jean Carroll gave in late June 2019 after over 20 years of silence – that Trump had assaulted her in the fitting rooms at Bergdorf Goodman’s.  (A report soon to be forgotten, just yesterday’s slime.)  I’ve read a little about it, and given T’s reputation (and his boasting, even), there seems to be every reason to take Carroll’s accusation seriously.  So I don’t mean to make light of the thing. 

BUT my first thought, on reading the lead-in, was, what on earth was Trump doing in the ladies’ fitting room?  I’ve never been to Bergdorf’s, but I don’t expect they’d allow any man into the ladies’ fitting room, unless of course he were dressed as a woman.  So I conclude that Trump must be a cross-dresser from way back.  (Maybe he was trying on something new and tried his best line on Ms. Carroll, “Do you mind unzipping me, dearie?  By the way, just call me Donatella”, to get things going.) 

Perhaps the staff at Bergdorf’s knew him perfectly well (their code name for him Corporal Klinger), and were on to his game, but if so, they were admirably ahead of their time in treating Trump as he preferred to “identify”, instead of throwing him out like a freak.  (If that was a rainbow policy for the ladies’ fitting rooms, it found its weak point when DJT met Ms. Carroll.)  On principle they were only right to accommodate him – after all, how can you expect a man to buy a dress without trying it on? 

So it’s Donald Trump’s secret life.

Really it shouldn’t be so surprising.  Don’t presume that cross-dressing men are all gay.  These super-macho, straight alpha males have a tough life, keeping up all that bluster, always having to come on strong.  We must realize that sometimes they need to express another side of themselves, a more feminine aspect, all slinky and smooth.  Sometimes they need to feel pretty, and what will do that better than really sexy underwear, a fantastic outfit, and full make-up? 

So, Don – take my advice and loosen up a little.  Let down your hair, all of it (check the glue first), and come out of your wife’s closet.  (You’re ruining her stuff anyway.)  Ask around, there are nightclubs where people like you get together.  (I bet you’ll just adore the shows.) Anyway, you’ll feel better, so much freer, coming out.  It might even win you a few votes.  Plus (if the votes aren’t enough), you could start a designer clothing line for big tough men who like to dress as women, a niche market with lots of untapped potential.  (The retail outlets you could call “chez Donatella”, or maybe “Daisy’s”, both prettier names than Donalda.) 

Allen Schill, July 2019

The illustration is a well-known drawing by Saul Steinberg, doctored by me. Thank you, Saul, I hope you don’t mind.  Here it is again, uncropped, showing the full subject, at least when he’s not in drag.

The Rabbit, by Saul Steinberg, 1986 (hair by AS).

One good drawing deserves another.  The caricature is by David Levine, of Trump in 1988.  I must have seen it back then and forgotten it, since Trump was such a forgettable and ridiculous blowhard, one who carries his own pestilent swamp with him wherever he goes.  But when I saw the drawing again after 30 years, it took me a moment to notice the diaper.  Even then, Levine saw Trump’s fundamentally infantile nature. 

Donald Trump, by David Levine, 1988, from the New York Review of Books.

A Donald Trump duck toy, a present from a friend.  It quacks as well as any rubber duck.  Since I’m a shower person, it was of no use to me in the bathtub, so for fun I gave it the voodoo treatment.

An archive photo (borrowed from Getty) of the premiere of Leni Riefenstahl’s notorious Nazi propaganda film, The Triumph of the Will (1935), doctored by me to spell Trump instead of Triumph.  The decor is classic fascist style, which keeps coming back, like a stubborn case of tapeworm.

“The Shithole President”, a satirical illustration by Gerald Scarfe.  Excuse the vulgarity of  the title and the subject; Scarfe is only borrowing from the public language of the President himself.

An illustration of Alfred Jarry’s character Ubu Roi, or King Ubu, by Jean-Martin Bontoux, late 20th century.  Jarry’s egocentric fool, with a head like a rotten fig, is highly comparable to Donald Trump.  Don’t miss Ubu’s 18th-century battleship collar, complete with cannons.

And finally, for a little class, here’s Joel-Peter Witkin’s excellent photograph, “The Great Masturbator and the Country He Rode In On”, from 2017.  You’re the top, Joel-Peter.  (Thanks for the girdle, or it would have been just too obscene.)

A Presidential Portrait, of the School of Arcimboldo (inspired while I sat on the Throne of Meditation):  we keep some spare TP stuffed in the radiator, which suggested eyes. A hand towel made a necktie, and an empty TP roll the indispensable mouth. I only had to Photoshop the mop head to get the hair color.

And now - you’re fired!!!