Donald Trump shot back against a Democratic messaging strategy that seemingly got under his skin, in an interview with “The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show,” a conservative radio show.
Responding to Vice President Kamala Harris and Democratic campaign surrogates labeling the Trump campaign “weird,” garnering instant media attention and massive social media virality, the former president tried to flip the script.
“They’re the weird ones. Nobody’s ever called me weird. I’m a lot of things, but weird I’m not. And I’m upfront. And he’s not either, I will tell you. JD is not at all. They are,” Trump said.
Trump was calling into the show to react to a so-called “transgender Olympic boxing outrage” that’s seemingly brewing on far-right conspiracy-laden social media – a somewhat weird reaction to have on a major day for American athletes, including gymnastics superstar Simone Biles’ historic gold medal win.
If Trump was trying to beat the “weird” allegations, he picked a tough topic. Extremist rhetoric against trans individuals is offputting to many voters, analysts say, especially against children. Despite that, Trump told Travis that “men will not be playing in women's sports” against his 17-year-old granddaughter in golf games.
The term "weird" picked up steam after Minnesota Governor Tim Walz claimed Democrats were “not afraid of weird people,” pointing to Trump and Vance’s stance on women’s rights, single people, and obsession with kids’ books.
The label, which made its way onto the Harris campaign’s biggest stage yet in an Atlanta rally this week, and gained millions of views on the “Kamala HQ” TikTok account, has been met in similar ways by other Trump campaign surrogates, including Marco Rubio, who simply responded that Democrats were weirder in a Tuesday interview.
Meanwhile, historically unpopular running mate JD Vance, himself associated with some weird conspiracies, gave an instantly memed response when asked about the label coined by Walz, laughing that it “doesn’t hurt my feelings.”
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