Is Trump’s eagerness to use military force on domestic protesters a measure of his confidence—or his weakness?
Donald Trump’s decision to mobilize the military in Los Angeles, against the reasoned judgment and expressed wishes of LA Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, presents yet another opportunity to observe, in real time, how the Trump era continues to be shot through with destructive and antiquated ideas about masculine strength—along with growing pushback against them.
It might or might not be coincidental, but the fact that Trump called in the National Guard and a contingent of Marines to do what local law enforcement was perfectly capable of handling came during the week before the president’s expensive and ostentatious celebration of military prowess, planned for June 14 in Washington, D.C.
That public display of military hardware and martial might—an exhibitionist obsession of many autocratic rulers over the past century—is timed to coincide with both the Army’s 250-year anniversary and Trump’s own 79th birthday. That it’s happening over Father’s Day weekend adds yet another gendered overlay to the cultural politics of the moment.
One way to understand this blizzard of events is to see them in some context. For example, in my 2016 book about presidential masculinity, Man Enough?, I argued that the American presidency occupies a critically important symbolic space in the gender order, largely because more than any single person, the U.S. president embodies the national identity.
As a result—and in a country that sees itself as the apex of masculine “rugged individualism”—the ways in which the president performs his masculinity are both drawn from and have a disproportionate impact upon which qualities of “manhood” are esteemed, rewarded during any given period and which are disdained.
The powerful masculine symbolism surrounding the U.S. presidency is also arguably the single biggest reason why we have never elected a woman president. To date, no woman has been able to successfully navigate the delicate balancing act required to be seen as simultaneously strong enough to act as commander-in-chief, defend the country, and also be feminine enough to be “likeable.”
It’s a terribly unfair burden, one that reveals the deep misogyny that underlies the perpetuation of the monopoly and near-monopoly that men—especially white men—have on the highest stations of economic and political power.
The gendered nature of the presidency is made especially visible when it comes to threats to the nation on matters both foreign and domestic. That’s because the president functions, essentially, as the nation’s protector—which itself taps into normative and even elemental expectations about men’s roles in patriarchal societies.
All of which is why the debate over Trump ordering the military to intervene in local protests in Los Angeles raises important questions about how this society defines masculine strength in the 21st century. Is Trump’s seeming eagerness to use military force on domestic protesters a measure of his confidence—or his weakness?
What is indisputable is that the right has, in recent decades, successfully weaponized some of the more cartoonish definitions of strength, and positioned the Republican Party as the natural home of “real men.”
This process has been on overdrive in the Trump era. Let’s not forget the hypermasculine, WWE-like spectacle of the 2024 Republican National Convention, or right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk’s assertion that “If you are a man in this country and you don’t vote for Trump, you’re not a man.”
Trump won two of the last three presidential elections primarily—but not exclusively—because he won the white men’s vote decisively. Especially the working-class white men’s vote. In the “brocast election” of 2024, it’s also notable that he was supported by 56 percent of young men, compared to only 41 percent of them in 2020—a 15-point swing in a “vibe” election in which many low engagement male voters pulled the lever for Trump for reasons that had little to do with ideology or policy.
Trump won two of the last three presidential elections primarily—but not exclusively—because he won the white men’s vote decisively. Especially the working-class white men’s vote.
Trump’s political success has been made possible by narrow ideas about what it means to be a strong man and leader that, unfortunately, appear to be shared by millions of Americans. It’s also clear that until now, Trump has benefited politically from the fact that his strongest supporters—especially men, but many women, too—endorse his aggressive actions, however nakedly performative, especially when it comes to matters of law and order.
Trump continues to have his sycophants and apologists, who try to spin every ill-conceived policy and diplomatic gaffe as evidence that the former reality TV star is playing 3D chess while his opponents are stuck playing checkers. They—like Trump himself—can never admit he’s made a mistake or acted unwisely on emotional impulses.
When Elon Musk recently turned on Trump, even going so far as to say that he should be impeached, Trump’s backers on Fox News and conservative talk radio widely dismissed the mega-wealthy man’s comments not as hurtful truth-telling by someone who knew Trump up close, but as part of a personal feud between two highly competitive alpha males. Nothing to see here, let’s move on.
But not everyone is buying what Trump is selling. In fact, it’s become increasingly common for liberal and moderate commentators in old and new media to offer critiques—often mocking critiques—of Trump’s hypermasculine posturing.
“Trump wants to be a strongman, but he’s actually a weak man,” Jamelle Bouie argues in a New York Times article that Trump’s resort to coercion and force are signs of his and his administration’s weakness:
“The White House clearly believes its actions are a show of strength,” he writes. “But again, they are not. The immediate recourse to repressive force; the inability to handle even modest opposition to its plans; the threats, bullying and overheated rhetoric—it betrays a sense of brittleness and insecurity.”
“Power, real power, rests on legitimacy and consent. A regime that has to deploy force at the first sign of dissent is a regime that does not actually believe it can wield power short of coercion and open threats of violence.”
Longtime Democratic strategist Simon Rosenberg takes it even further. He says that Trump has escalated his rhetoric and deployed the military in Los Angeles in part, as a reaction to a series of events that included very bad poll numbers as well as Musk’s humiliation of Trump during their very public “break-up.”
Rosenberg acknowledged that his perceptions were based on gut instincts and not data, but he said on his Hopium Chronicles Substack, that Musk’s criticism hurt Trump deeply, especially because Musk is much richer than Trump, has a bigger social media platform, and has great credibility with and access to MAGA-world. As a result, his mocking of Trump and calls for his removal from office in effect “emasculated” the president.
All of which provided part of the rationale for the Trump administration’s belligerent—and probably unlawful—actions in California.
“This delusional madman who is running our country got wounded,” Rosenberg said. “(He) got his feelings hurt by Elon … and has needed to reestablish his strength. As we talk about here all the time, what is so essential to understanding Trump is that he sees the world in a very simple way, which is strong and weak, winning and losing. And he needs to be strong and winning, and not weak and losing. But the truth is that he is weak and he’s not strong, and he is losing and he’s not winning. He’s a blubbery baby-man, not a strong man.”
The historian Heather Cox Richardson bluntly summed up the political stakes involved: “There is no doubt that as their other initiatives have stalled and popular opinion is turning against the administration on every issue,” she wrote, “the Trump regime is trying to establish a police state.”
In another Substack post, Richardson also reported that some key Republican officials were uneasy about the military parade on Trump’s birthday. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who has criticized Trump’s budget reconciliation bill, yesterday said: “I love parades, but I’m not really excited about $40 million for a parade. I don’t really think the symbolism of tanks and missiles is really what we’re all about …. All the images that come to mind are Soviet Union and North Korea.”
But for Trump, much more than money is at stake when rivals or adversaries seek to impede his efforts at performative displays of masculine power. Earlier this week, Richardson wrote that Paul told Politico that the White House has uninvited him from the annual White House picnic for members of Congress and their families, a move that Paul learned of only when he tried to pick up the tickets and that he called “incredibly petty.” He commented that the “level of immaturity is beyond words.”
Meanwhile, liberal and progressive voices in politics and media have cautioned anti-Trump protesters to avoid violence at all costs, because it enhances Trump’s power by providing him with the pretext to deploy violent state power in response. This guidance carries a powerful gendered subtext that is rarely expressed out loud, even on the left.
One recent instance involved the actor, director, and documentary film narrator Peter Coyote. In a Substack post directed at anti-Trump protesters, he urged them to understand that public protest is theater, and the audience is never the police, the politicians or the Congress; it is always the American people. With apparent reference to the counterproductive, violent actions of a small group of left-wing activists in recent years, the first piece of advice he gave was to let women organize the event.
“They’re more collaborative,“ he wrote. “They’re more inclusive, and they don’t generally bring the undertones of violence men do.”
Editor’s note: A special feature section in the Summer 2025 issue of Ms. is guest-edited by Jackson Katz, where he and other writers and thought leaders explore issues of American masculinity in depth. Join today to get our newest issue delivered straight to your mailbox at our special offer price of just $20—a 43 percent discount off the regular membership price!—and fuel another year of our reporting, rebelling and truth-telling.
