Yesterday, Trump named two men — one of whom is a leading white nationalist figure — as his top advisers to the White House.
All seven of the top officials on his transition team are men. Of the 23 members of the transition’s executive committee, just four are women. One of the four women is Trump’s daughter, Ivanka.
The New York Times has produced a “short list” of people under consideration for top White House posts. There are 57 entries. 6 are women.
Yet the Associated Press says Trump is about to make history because he is considering a woman for one leadership post: chair of the Republican National Committee.
Here’s how the Associated Press frames the news, with emphasis added.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump is considering a woman and an openly gay man to fill major positions in his new leadership team, history-making moves that would inject diversity into a Trump administration already facing questions about its ties to white nationalists.
The chair of the Republican National Committee is not part of the Trump administration. Nor is the appointment of a woman to lead a major political party “history-making.”
The Democratic Party’s first female chair, Jean Westwood, was appointed in 1972.
The AP’s coverage is part of the normalization of Donald Trump. The candidate routinely belittled and demeaned women as a candidate — and none have been named to top posts in his transition or administration. During the campaign itself, more than 10 women accused Trump of sexual assault.
The remaking of Trump as a history-making champion of gender diversity less than a week after his election illustrates just how far, and how fast, the bar has been lowered.
Similarly, when Trump appointed the proprietor of a white nationalist website as his “chief strategist,” newspaper headlines described him as a “loyalist” and “outsider.”