My Soul Sister, the Trumpster

I didn't see this coming. Trumpism hits home.

Portrait of two young women by Henri-François Riesener

IT IS UNDOUBTEDLY A SIGN of my stunted imagination that I cannot fathom that gentle people who read serious books would vote for Donald Trump. 

You see, I am at a loss how to reply to an email from an old friend from my high school days in Houston. Reacting to my last post (“Every Woman Adores a Fascist”) about America’s adoration of a putative strongman, she responded that Kamala Harris lost because she wasn’t a great candidate. That Harris wasn’t the best choice to run against Trump, I don’t really disagree.

What threw me over the edge, though, was her attempt to make me feel better. “Trump isn't a likable person,” she wrote, “but maybe something good will come out of the next 4 years.”  And when I asked, incredulously, what good could possibly result, she replied with a litany of items, including an end to inflation and the greater possibility of world peace. 

Then she added: “A weak US prompts other countries to take the advantage. China might have attacked Taiwan if the Democrats stayed in power.” A few lines down, she praised Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whom Trump nominated to be the next secretary of Health and Human Services: “RFK Jr. wants to work on solving why so many kids are developing autism. And making our food supply safer.”

At this point, I was nearly apoplectic. 

Speaking as an immigrant from Taiwan, I can assure you that the Taiwanese are not dancing in the streets because of Trump’s win. If anything, there’s genuine fear that China’s President Xi Jinping will be much more emboldened, betting that Trump will likely do squat to protect Taiwan or any other nation under attack. And if Xi threw Trump a bone in the bargain, like a prime hotel property on The Bund in Shanghai, there’d be a “peaceful” takeover of Taiwan in a New York minute.

And what more can I say about her belief in RFK Jr. and his claims about the connection between vaccines and autism that every reputable medical journal has discredited? That this bona fide conspiracy nut with no medical training (he made his mark as an environmental lawyer) should be in charge of the world’s largest, most prestigious public health agency with oversight over vaccines, cancer, Alzheimer's, and other diseases, should be cause for absolute panic.

What was unsettling is the misinformation that is at the core of my friend’s reasoning. It’s as if she had drunk from the Trump firehose in one gulp. I almost wished her reason for supporting Trump was based on something more selfish or ideological, like the finance types who only care about taxes, the Big Oil executives who want to end environmental regulations or the religious zealots who aim for the establishment of theocracy. Those are rational choices, however cynical or transactional.

But to cast another Trump presidency as a harbinger of peace, strength, and stability is hard to understand. Of course, many Americans chose to believe just that, willing to excuse Trump’s pivotal role in the January 6 insurrection, his lies about a rigged election, his courtship of dictators, his stupidity (remember when he suggested disinfectant, UV light and hydroxychloroquine as cures for Covid?) and the countless ways he sowed distrust in our institutions, cheapened the presidency, and coarsened our culture. 

Still, how could my friend, whom I’ve always regarded as a spiritual sister of sorts, despite our obvious differences (she’s a white daughter of the South and I, a Chinese immigrant), be among them?

We had been very close once, bonded in the way that only two alienated teenagers could be in a Texas high school ruled by glossy cheerleaders and homecoming queens. In that land of pep rallies and football games, we ran the literary magazine. We were obsessed with Plath, Kafka, Salinger, and Dostoyevsky, reciting lines from their works like incantations. We smoked cigarettes, pretended to be poets, and roamed The Galleria after school—two dreamy girls longing for transcendence. 

I thought an appreciation for metaphor and nuance would inoculate one against the blunt force of misinformation. I assumed that those who parse words would resist the seduction of slogans, see through the shallowness, and take offense at the vulgarity and hate that beat in the heart of Donald Trump.

To be absolutely fair, I have no reason, no right, to think that we’d be aligned on politics or any matter at this point. It’s been over two decades since we last saw each other (she lives in rural Texas, and I in Manhattan), and our communication is sparse—the annual Christmas card and the occasional email. I am making assumptions, filling in blanks, that I know I am not entitled to do.

Through the years, I’ve always believed we shared a fundamental outlook, a discerning eye about what’s true and worthy. That belief has been badly shaken.

And yet, the bond between us is still there, forged at a critical, impressionable stage of our lives. That we will always care about each other, be protective of one another, I have no doubt. Perhaps this is a sort of new loneliness we’re entering: not the gulf created by time or physical distance, but the void of shared reality.

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