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Don’t Underestimate Donald Trump’s Coalition of the Weird

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Don’t Underestimate Donald Trump’s Coalition of the Weird

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August 30, 2024

The GOP’s new league of fringe figures tries to replicate the party’s winning formula of 2016. And it just might work again.

Don’t Underestimate Donald Trump’s Coalition of the Weird
Republican presidential candidate former president Donald Trump, left, poses for photos with Republican vice-presidential candidate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, before making remarks to a crowd during an event on August 21, 2024, in Asheboro, North Carolina.(Photo by Melissa Sue Gerrits / Getty Images)

When it comes to the politics of weirdness, pay attention to Donald Trump’s actions rather than his words. The Democrats have found an extremely successful gibe against Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, labeling them as weird. Trump and Vance have reacted to the “weird” accusation with a mixture of disdain and resentment. Speaking at a Pennsylvania rally on August 19, Trump took umbrage at the fact that the Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz said “that JD and I are weird. I think we’re extremely normal people.” In his typical schoolyard manner, Trump added that their rivals Kamala Harris and Tim Walz were worse than weird. According to Trump, “Between [Walz’s] movement and [Harris’s] laugh, there’s a lot of craziness, I’d say a step further than ‘weird.’ ‘Weird’ is a nice word in comparison.” Speaking in Wisconsin on Thursday, Trump said of Walz, “He is weird, right? He’s weird. I’m not weird.”

Yet, even as Trump is trying to fend off or minimize the “weird” accusation, he continues to elevate the weird as part of a deliberate strategy. On Tuesday, Semafor reporter Dave Weigel claimed that Trump was going “all in” for the “weird vote” by elevating as campaign spokespeople figures such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard—both former Democrats who have been relegated to the fringes for their heterodox views (Kennedy is an anti-vaxxer, and both he and Gabbard have been critical of some, although not all, forms of American foreign policy interventionism). While George W. Bush had to convene a somewhat dubious “coalition of the willing” to fight the Iraq War, Trump is assembling a coalition of the weird to defeat Harris and Walz.

The word “weird” is almost too gentle to describe Trump’s new team. Kennedy is known for his extremely eccentric personal history—which includes selling cocaine to fellow undergraduates at Harvard, keeping an extensive diary of his extramarital affairs during his first marriage, having a dead worm lodged in his brain, and bringing the carcass of a dead bear to Central Park in order to make it look like the animal was killed by a cyclist. Only last week, The New York Times reported that he once “Sawed the Head Off a Whale and Drove It Home,” according to his daughter Kick. With JD Vance turning off voters who see him as weird because of his reactionary gender politics, Kennedy is unlikely to help filter out the odor of weirdness around the Trump campaign.

When Gabbard endorsed Trump, Kennedy treated the announcement as if it were the expansion of a superhero team, tweeting, “Wonder Woman just joined the Justice League.” Along the same line, the official X account of the GOP tweeted out a photo that looked like a Justice League movie poster featuring Trump, Vance, Kennedy, Gabbard, and tech billionaire (and X owner) Elon Musk.

It’s telling that none of the figures shown with the former president supported him in 2016 or 2020, and all have spoken of him in vitriolic terms (according to The New Yorker, Kennedy earlier this year called Trump “a sociopath”). Kennedy is also, of course, the scion of a legendary political dynasty that has played a major role in Democratic politics for nearly a century.

As Weigel reports:

Democrats think they’re “weird.” The Trump campaign thinks they speak to persuadable voters—and enough of them to sway the election.

For months, Trump has stiff-armed party elders who were never comfortable with him, and elevated figures plugged into niche anti-establishment circles. From picking JD Vance, to courting Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and addressing the Libertarian Party, Trump is betting that there’s an untapped well of support from voters—mostly white, mostly male—at the political margins.

They may not be large in number, but Republicans see them as up for grabs in an otherwise polarized electorate; people who might vote third party, or not at all, but can be brought into the GOP fold with the right care and attention.

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This appeal to the weird includes a media strategy of appearing on niche podcasts that appeal to alienated voters (mainly young men) who cannot be reached by normal outlets. This strategy is a double-edged sword: In Jacobin and other publications, Vance has been accused of being too online and excessively amenable to advice from “Internet weirdos.” It’s true that on his frequent podcast appearances, Vance has often embarrassed himself, as when he agreed with a host that grandmothers helping with the raising of kids are fulfilling “the whole purpose of the postmenopausal female.”

But for the Trump campaign, such mishaps are worth the price of admission if they help get the message out to angry young men. As Weigel reports, “One Trump strategist said that the campaign now had six people who could credibly talk to anti-establishment podcasters with more viewers than nightly network news: Trump himself, his eldest sons, Vance, Kennedy, and Gabbard.”

The journalist Max Read describes this media strategy as “dipshit outreach.” Read paints a vivid picture of the types of podcasters and YouTube influencers Trump and his surrogates are using to get their message across:

This week, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made an appearance on the podcast of Road Rules and The Challenge contestant Theo Von, who has lately found success as a Zynternet-adjacent stand-up comic and podcaster. A clip from the podcast, in which Von describes the effects of cocaine to Trump, has gone somewhat viral, largely because it’s one of very few recent clips of Trump where he’s neither rambling nor bored. This interview comes on the heels of one with streamer Adin Ross earlier in August, and an interview with YouTuber/podcaster Logan Paul back in June; the same month, the Canadian pranksters of the YouTube channel “Nelk” recorded a TikTok on behalf of Trump’s vice-presidential candidate, Ohio senator J.D. Vance.

What do Von, Ross, Paul, and the Nelk Boys have in common? I’ll admit that it’s unfair to lump a harmless and affable dumbass like Von in with a malevolent little twerp like Ross. But they all provide varying levels of access to a large audience of young men who might find Trump appealing—guys who like “edgy,” trollish, hedonistic, attention-seeking personalities.

Read is skeptical that this “dipshit outreach” will pay off, since many of the listeners to these programs are not just low-propensity voters—they are actually too young to vote.

But Read might be too complacent. As strange as it may sound, the “coalition of the weird” strategy cannot be dismissed out of hand or seen as something that will automatically help Democrats. After all, a similar strategy helped Trump win in 2016.

As John Ganz noted in a 2023 Substack post, Trump’s victory in 2016 was based on his willingness to make a pitch to “any weird constituency.” The theory of the “coalition of the weird” goes like this: In a polarized America, both Democrats and Republicans have a base of around 47 percent of the vote that gives them a shot at winning. Elections are decided in swing states where victory depends on mobilizing especially passionate voters. If you can add to the base you already have a sufficient number of fringe voters with special issues, you can win. Thus in 2016, Trump made overtures to groups like Gamergaters (video game players who objected to feminist critiques of their hobby), goldbugs, the openly racist alt-right, and anti-vaxxers. These groups are all small in numbers, but they appreciated Trump’s willingness to echo their ideas and slogans. And together they gave him enough electoral juice to defeat Hillary Clinton. Since then, Trump’s coalition has expanded to included QAnon conspiracy theorists.

Trump’s current “coalition of the weird” is a reprise of this strategy. It’s a risky strategy because it helps power the Democratic argument that Trump and Vance are too weird to be allowed anywhere near the White House. But the Democrats also run the risk of alienating voters who are drawn to the more plausible and defensible positions advocated by figures such as Kennedy and Gabbard.

In a Substack post, journalist Ken Klippenstein described how he’s heard people who oppose Trump praise Kennedy’s speech endorsing Trump. This is Klippenstein’s account of the speech:

I watched the speech and got a taste of why his message resonates so strongly, despite the avalanche of news focusing on RFK’s bizarre personal history and his anti-vax stance. I came away not with an appreciation for RFK, but for the hunger people clearly feel for someone, anyone to talk about the issues he raises. He resonates not because of any clarity of thought or grasp of the issues or the solutions he advances. The appeal is in the problems he identifies—from endless wars like in Ukraine to the utter failure of the U.S. healthcare system—which Trump and Kamala Harris have been disinclined to discuss.

Klippenstein is right that there has been a dearth of serious and plausible policy statements from either candidate on the large problems facing America. One could expand his list to include the escalating war in the Middle East, which is an even more striking case because on that issue Kennedy and Gabbard are just as hawkish as mainstream Democrats and Republicans.

In the absence of real politics, some part of the public will be attracted to fringe characters who at least promise a change. By creating a “coalition of the weird,” Trump is conjuring an illusion for those voters to suggest that he could be a change candidate.

Currently, Kamala Harris is leading in the polls, and there are certainly reasons to be optimistic about her chances. But if the race tightens, Democrats will have to confront the fact that the “weird” label only gets you so far. In the absence of genuine hope, and meaningful change, weird could win again.

Or as Hunter S. Thompson long ago taught us, “when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.”

Can we count on you?

In the coming election, the fate of our democracy and fundamental civil rights are on the ballot. The conservative architects of Project 2025 are scheming to institutionalize Donald Trump’s authoritarian vision across all levels of government if he should win.

We’ve already seen events that fill us with both dread and cautious optimism—throughout it all, The Nation has been a bulwark against misinformation and an advocate for bold, principled perspectives. Our dedicated writers have sat down with Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders for interviews, unpacked the shallow right-wing populist appeals of J.D. Vance, and debated the pathway for a Democratic victory in November.

Stories like these and the one you just read are vital at this critical juncture in our country’s history. Now more than ever, we need clear-eyed and deeply reported independent journalism to make sense of the headlines and sort fact from fiction. Donate today and join our 160-year legacy of speaking truth to power and uplifting the voices of grassroots advocates.

Throughout 2024 and what is likely the defining election of our lifetimes, we need your support to continue publishing the insightful journalism you rely on.

Thank you,
The Editors of The Nation

Jeet Heer



Jeet Heer is a national affairs correspondent for The Nation and host of the weekly Nation podcast, The Time of Monsters. He also pens the monthly column “Morbid Symptoms.” The author of In Love with Art: Francoise Mouly’s Adventures in Comics with Art Spiegelman (2013) and Sweet Lechery: Reviews, Essays and Profiles (2014), Heer has written for numerous publications, including The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The American Prospect, The Guardian, The New Republic, and The Boston Globe.

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The complex Kennedy legacy has reactionary as well as liberal strands. Former Republican presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Donald Trump shake hands during a campaign rally at Desert Diamond Arena on August 23, 2024, in Glendale, Arizona. When he endorsed Donald Trump last Friday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (RFK Jr.) ignited a family drama. His famous family name is one of RFK Jr.’s main political assets, so it was not surprising that in explaining why he was suspending his campaign and backing Trump, he claimed the posthumous support of the two most famous members of his clan, his father, Robert F. Kennedy (RFK), and his uncle John F. Kennedy (JFK), both assassinated in the 1960s. RFK Jr. claimed that the two deceased statesmen “are looking down right now and they are very, very proud.” This audacious and galling claim was too much for Kennedy’s family. Five of RFK Jr.’s siblings issued a statement saying the endorsement was a “a betrayal of the values our father and our family hold most dear.” This letter was signed by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Courtney Kennedy, Kerry Kennedy, Chris Kennedy, and Rory Kennedy. In an interview with MSNBC, Kerry Kennedy said she was “outraged and disgusted by my brother’s gaudy and obscene embrace of Donald Trump.” She added that her father “would have detested almost everything Donald Trump represents if he was alive today.” Another RFK descendant, brother Max, wrote an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times that denounced RFK Jr.’s support of Trump as “sordid,” as well as “a hollow grab for power, a strategic attempt at relevance.” Max Kennedy noted that prior to backing Trump, his brother had unsuccessfully approached the Harris campaign with a quid pro quo, a possible endorsement in exchange for a position in her administration. It appears that Trump made the kind of deal RFK Jr. wanted, so if Trump returns to the White House there will be a position waiting for the black sheep of the Kennedy dynasty. RFK Jr. boasted to Tucker Carlson that he’ll be part of Trump’s transition team and “help pick the people who will be running the government.” Writing in The Washington Post, columnist Karen Tumulty lamented that “RFK Jr. has sullied the Kennedy name and the dimming aura of Camelot.” It’s undeniable that RFK Jr. has betrayed the liberalism that his family, in its best moments, embodied. Indeed, RFK Jr. also proved disloyal to his own stated values, since only a few years ago he condemned Trump as a “threat to democracy,” “a terrible president,” and “a sociopath” whose politics was based on “bigotry,” “hatred,” and “xenophobia.” Given this abrupt about-face, it’s not surprising that former close collaborators with RFK Jr., notably the investigative journalist Greg Palast, openly speak about the politician as someone who has “lost his mind” But as manifestly corrupt as RFK Jr.’s behavior is, we should be wary of the narrative of Camelot betrayed, which relies on the attractive fiction that there is a unified and unsullied Kennedy legacy. In truth, the Kennedys, who have been national figures for more than a century, have been all over the map politically—not always in admirable ways. The family have long been Democrats, but at times very reactionary ones, in a manner that does decidedly show an affinity for Trumpism. As the historian Garry Wills documented in his classic book The Kennedy Imprisonment (1982), the most searching of all books about the dynasty, the family’s patriarch, Joseph Kennedy (1888–1969), imprinted on his large brood a host of bad habits. The grandchild of Irish immigrants and son of a successful Boston politician, Kennedy rose to stratospheric wealth through the stock market and liquor (although not, contrary to popular myths, by bootlegging). But his plutocratic success didn’t win Kennedy many friends among Boston’s Brahmins—snooty WASPs who saw the Irish as inherently low-class. Stung by social rejection, Kennedy pursued alternative paths to status via Hollywood (taking, among many other starlets, Gloria Swanson as a mistress) and politics. Although a Democrat who was appointed as ambassador to England from 1938 to 1940, Kennedy fought bitterly with President Franklin D. Roosevelt. During his disastrous term as ambassador, Kennedy threw in his lot with the aristocratic Cliveden set in England who wanted to accept Hitler as overlord of Europe in order to build a bulwark against communism. When his own government rejected this embrace of Nazi domination of Europe, Kennedy concluded that FDR’s mind had been poisoned by a cabal of wicked Jews (such as Felix Frankfurter and Sidney Hillman) who were dragging America to war. A primordial patriarch, Kennedy saw the world in belligerent macho terms: All men were rivals; all women existed for sexual conquest. He passed along this attitude to many of his sons, sometimes, as Wills and other historians have documented, sharing his mistresses with his boys. As Wills conclusively shows, this macho attitude was a pervasive part of the life of JFK and RFK (although RFK, who had a streak of devout Catholicism, was not a compulsive womanizer). During the 1950s both Kennedy brothers were classic Cold War militant anti-communists. JFK was pals with Joseph McCarthy, even going on double dates with the Wisconsin demagogue. RFK served on the staff of McCarthy’s Senate Subcommittee on Investigations and wanted to be chief counsel, a job that was won by Roy Cohn (who would go on to be Donald Trump’s mentor in the art of dirty politics). In 1960, JFK ran to the right of Richard Nixon on foreign policy, decrying a fictional missile gap. As Wills notes, the failed invasion of Cuba in 1961 at the Bay of Pigs was a pure distillation of the Kennedy style of masculinist politics. The Bay of Pigs, Wills argues, was taken to heart because it was so clearly marked with the new traits of Kennedy’s own government. It had for its target the man who obsessed Kennedy. It had for its leader the ideal of Kennedy’s “best and brightest.” It was a chess game backed by daring—played mind to mind, macho to macho, charisma to charisma. It was a James Bond exploit blessed by Yale, a PT raid run by Ph.D.s. It was the very definition of the New Frontier. To the credit of the Kennedys, they also had a capacity to learn from their mistakes. During the Cuban missile crisis, JFK discovered how dangerous brinksmanship could be. A new openness to diplomacy can be heard in JFK’s address to American University, delivered on June 10, 1963, just five months before he was assassinated. JFK’s counterinsurgency program and meddling in South Vietnamese politics (including turning a blind eye to the assassination plot against President Ngo Dinh Diem) entangled the United States in a disastrous war. But by the late 1960s, both RFK Jr. and Edward Kennedy were outspoken critics of that war. Edward Kennedy went on to be an outstanding liberal senator, although his role in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, a manslaughter case covered by Kennedy cronies, is a reminder of the family’s outrageous license. And Edward Kennedy remained unchecked in his sexual harassment of women, a lasting family trait. Last November, I appeared on the podcast Know Your Enemy to talk about Wills’s Kennedy Imprisonment. The show’s cohost Sam Adler-Bell noted that, on many points, the JFK in the book reminded him of Donald Trump: an aggressive and exploitive womanizer with vulgar taste who was saturated with media culture (Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack in the case of JFK, reality TV in the case of Trump). The Kennedy presidency was the first really media-dominated administration, obsessed with “charisma” (an idea taken from the sociologist Max Weber but popularized in that era) and image-making (a concept expounded in 1962 by the historian Daniel J. Boorstin). The traits of charismatic leadership, as detailed by the sociologist Reinhard Bendix and distilled by Wills, are eerily prescient of the Trump era: a loose, personal style of leadership that prioritizes the loyalty of cronies and transactional deal-making above consensus building, democratic accountability, or following norms. Further, the aristocratic ideals JFK inherited from his perversely Anglophilic father, the belief that strong societies require great leaders who can transcend the blindness of the masses, was the seedbed of antidemocratic impulses that still bedevil American society. The Kennedys, therefore, have a mixed legacy. If they have been leaders of American liberalism, they’ve also at times embodied anti-liberal impulses that are antithetical to democracy. One way to describe RFK Jr.’s politics is that in endorsing Trump he is abandoning the liberalism of Edward Kennedy and reverting to the America First authoritarianism of his grandfather. It’s easy to understand why RFK, his siblings, and his cousins all remain haunted by the legacy of their family. To be the children of great men who were killed young is a heavy burden. This is part of what Wills means by the Kennedy imprisonment. But both the family and America would benefit from finding a way to escape this prison. The problem is not just that RFK Jr. has betrayed his father’s legacy, but also that he and America need to be more clear-eyed about how limited that legacy is. Camelot was always a myth. To move forward, that myth has to be left behind.

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