How Trump’s America Turned Pageants Into Politics

The beauty queens of Maga world. According to the Wall Street Journal, beauty pageants have found an unlikely second act in Trump's America. When Denmark's Victoria Kajeer Thielvig. I think that's how you pronounce her name. Was crowned Miss Universe last month. South Dakota State Senator and former Miss South Dakota Amber Hulse posted quote, trump is president and Miss Universe is blonde. We are so back. It wasn't just a joke. Pageant veterans now hold key roles in Trump's inner circle, from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, used to be a beauty pageant contestant, to federal prosecutor Lindsey Halligan and Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly, all beauty pageant contestant winners. The crossover reflects what EV Magazine calls a return to traditional femininity. Critics see something else, a revival of the old male gaze. As historian Kimberlin Hamlin put it, the pageant world rules for success are similar to the Trump world rules always look perfect, be charming, and do what the boss wants. Pageants once promised empowerment. Now they may symbolize a new political obedience in heels. So what's the real message here? Yes, we as human beings prefer beauty, all things being equal, but all things are not being equal. And what we're seeing in this administration is again and again and again, forget merit, forget credentials. It's, are you really good looking? Are you really hot? If yes, check you get the job. Let's dig a little bit deeper here, because there is a lot to this. And it's not just a sexist thing. There's plenty of sexism here. There's no doubt about it. But Donald Trump in many, many occasions makes comments about the looks of the men he hires. I mean, this is just not normal thing. This is not something Biden did or Reagan did or any of the Bushes did. They didn't say, well, I'm picking this guy to be Secretary of State because he looks like something out of central casting. That's just not how anyone has thought about this. And other than Howard Lucknick, the Secretary of Commerce, almost all of the men Trump picks have to have, like, a perfect head of hair. You can say, well, T.J. you're just jealous your hair's not good enough to be in the Trump administration. Well, there's plenty of reasons why I'm not serving the Trump administration. That is, that's not the top 10 list. Okay? But certainly by all accounts that I've seen, our Secretary of defense War Pete Hegseth, was picked for that position in part because he has a great head of hair and he looks good on television. Let's look at some of these other pageant winners again. Amber Hulse is now a Republican state senator. She's a former Miss South Dakota, Kristi Noem. She was the South Dakota Snow Queen. She's now our Homeland Security secretary. And she's always old, dolled up and makeup and the bowtie, I mean, she really looks like she's auditioning to be a Housewives of Beverly Hills. When you look at pictures of her today versus 10 years ago, there's like completely different people. Lindsey Halligan appointed a federal prosecutor. This one really takes the cake. The first few times I saw her picture in the Times and other publications, I thought, wow, these photo editors really screwed up. They were supposed to put the picture of a grizzled prosecutor up and instead they accidentally used a picture of the COVID from Cosmopolitan magazine. Well, oops, the mistake was mine because it is the same person. And she really does look like a centerfold model from Cosmopolitan magazine. She's stunningly beautiful. That's not a qualification to be a prosecutor. Apparently there's two, there's two qualifications right now to be a prosecutor in the Trump universe. One is you have to look at all of the evidence very, very carefully. That's step one. Ignore it. And then do whatever Trump wants. If Trump says, I don't like somebody, I don't like the cut of his jib. He once said I had fat fingers. Throw him in prison. You say, yes, boss, Absolutely right away. So that's the first thing you have to do to be considered credible and legitimate for a high level appointment in this administration. The second one is, especially if you're a woman, you gotta be really good looking. You gotta have that long blonde hair like Pam Bondi. You gotta spend as much or more time in the makeup room and the hairstyling room as Dear Leader does. And by many accounts, that's at least a couple hours a day. Which, let's be honest now, that is why Pam Bondi was selected first. She was a. She's a loyal henchwoman, will do anything Donald Trump says and also by all accounts, is kind of reminds Trump of his daughter. And we know what his daughter reminds him of too, right? Mary says, your head's so shiny, I can see my reflection. Well, thank you, Mary. I do try to put powder on. Maybe I should have put more powder on today, but thank you for that. You know, everybody's superficial. I'm superficial, Mary is. Others are. That's okay. But when it comes to selecting people of power and influence who really control our entire society, who goes to prison, who doesn't, who lives, who dies, who goes to war, who doesn't. Even the most superficial people I know say, yeah, we should really focus on their credentials and their capabilities, not how good they look. Anna Kelly is another one. She was a former Miss State Fair of Virginia. She's now the deputy press secretary. Now, Erica Kirk is not a member of, of this administration, but they certainly have close ties. Now she's the former Miss Arizona USA. Abby Stockard, Miss America 2025, wore a make America Healthy Again gown to the inauguration. Now, a couple of things I need to point out in full disclosure to you. So Trump once owned the Miss USA and Miss Universe and Miss Teen USA pageants and he would brag about how great it was because he could just walk into the dressing room and look at young teenage girls naked. His words, not mine. He bragged about. They said, it's great when you're the owner, you can do whatever you want. So there's a long history there of him talking, obsessing over how beautiful, how good looking young women are. Now, full disclosure, I never walked in, in any dressing room where women were dressing and looked at naked women. But I was the official media trainer for the Miss Miss Universe contest and trained not one, but several Miss Universes. When Trump, in fact, owned the pageant, I didn't have to deal with him. Thankfully, I've trained Ms. Teen USAs as well. And a lot of these women are very, very ambitious, smart, articulate, want to learn how to know the media and want to build on this. They see that as a springboard. And it's not entirely a political thing. Let's not forget Oprah Winfrey was Miss Tennessee at one point. Diane Sawyer, the former ABC News anchor, was a beauty pageant winner. Martha Stewart was a beauty pageant winner. So especially before the days of women being able to play sports and get attention that way, beauty pageants have been a vehicle for women getting attention, learning media skills that a high school basketball star would get after the game, doing media interviews. So there was some rough parallel. The difference is if you're a college football player, you don't have to sort of prance around in your underwear the way a lot of beauty pageants traditionally did. So I want you to keep this in mind the next time you hear about thank goodness we're getting rid of DEI and ask yourself, are we replacing it with something better or worse? Because yes, if you are, if you're hiring a hostess for a brand new hot chic restaurant, maybe it does make sense to have a really, really hot male or female host or hostess. But if you're hiring a secretary of Defense who's going to make decisions about hundreds of thousands and millions of lives, people living and dying, maybe they don't need to be a GQ model. Maybe they don't need to be a Cosmopolitan model either. That's it for today, folks. I appreciate you spending time with me today and every day. Here's my commitment to you. If you spend a little time with me here, unfiltered each day, you're going to learn more about the news and you're going to learn some tips, some better tips on how to be more successful yourself. Your communication skills, your personal development skills. My goal for you is to help you not just learn more about the news, but to learn more about yourself so that you can be successful in all aspects of life. Thanks for watching. Don't forget to Please leave a comment. Like it Sign up for notifications. Hit that bell. Subscribe if you're listening to us on a podcast platform. We've only been on podcast platforms for the last six weeks, so please follow us whether you're on Spotify, whether you're on Apple Podcast or itunes or any other platform. And please leave a review. Thanks so much. I'll see you tomorrow. Hope you enjoy the rest of your Sunday. I know I'm going to. It's already been a great Sunday. I played some great pickleball this morning with my wife. We had a great time. It was 69 degrees this morning here in South Florida. The coolest it's been in probably the last seven months. It's getting to be a beautiful time of year. Hope it's beautiful wherever you are. See you tomorrow.