Trump Isn’t Defending Women. Women Are.

After Donald Trump canceled $175 million in federal funding to the University of Pennsylvania earlier this month over their policy around transgender women in sports, it could not be clearer that he is not stopping there. He is coming for all women.

On the first day of his second administration, the president signed an executive order claiming to “defend women.” It’s a familiar refrain. When the Ku Klux Klan brutally terrorized and murdered Black men, they claimed they were insulating women from crime. When men campaigned against women’s suffrage, they promised women “more protection” if they stayed out of politics. Drawing from this tradition, Trump’s pledge was a guise to attack transgender people. 

The truth is that Donald Trump’s purported defense of women is harming millions of us every day.

The president is doing everything in his power to make it more difficult for patients to receive abortion care. And he’s hell bent on rolling back protections making it possible for women to join the workforce and that keep women and girls safe from harassment at school. He is using every opportunity to scapegoat transgender women and scale back their rights. His freeze on federal funding disrupted rape crisis centers and left health clinics bankrupt of resources, preventing millions of women from receiving care. And now Republican leadership in Congress is proposing cuts to Medicaid and food benefits, at the expense of women and families.

None of it is a surprise when you see who Trump surrounds himself with. The president, who has himself been found liable for sexual assault, has staffed his administration with people accused of similar crimes. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth admitted that he paid $50,000 to a woman accusing him of sexual assault. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy apologized by text to a family babysitter who accused him of sexual assault. 

The serious allegations following this administration’s top officials are complemented by regressive viewpoints touted by them and others in the administration. Darren Beattie, selected for a top State Department job, for example, believes “competent white men must be in charge if you want things to work.” And Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, who is also leading the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), shared a post claiming that “a Republic of high status males is best for decision making.” Meanwhile, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem once defended her state’s extreme abortion ban, and Attorney General Pam Bondi called marriage equality a “serious public harm.” This barely scratches the surface of the newly institutionalized misogyny at the highest levels of the federal government.

All of it comes as women in this country are already in real pain, for which the administration has no legitimate plan. New economic data released last year shows the gender wage gap widened for the first time in 20 years. This earnings gap accumulates to a significant median loss of nearly $12,000 annually — and more than $25,000 for Black women and $32,000 for Latinas. At the same time, skyrocketing child care costs, worsened by arbitrary federal funding freezes, are now forcing some women out of the workplace altogether.

There is a growing movement of people who see through Trump’s deceit and are doing something about it.

Lawyers are fighting back and asserting the rule of law. After all, discrimination based on sex is still illegal in the United States. LGBTQ+ workers are still protected under federal law. Abortion is protected by law in 21 states and the District of Columbia. Already, federal judges have halted the DOGE’s mass firings as well as the administration’s effort to limit health care access for transgender children.

But it is going to take many more of us banding together — starting with women ourselves. We must be relentless in exposing the gulf between Trump’s phony agenda to defend us and the very real cuts Republican leadership is proposing that threaten the wellbeing of women and families, including food assistance helping millions buy groceries and the health care covering about 40 percent of pregnancies. In order to pay for tax cuts for billionaires, Republican leadership has no choice but to save money elsewhere, and we are their targets. 

This crisis demands that we build a bigger tent of women—across race, place, age and class—who see right through the fear tactics and demand material changes for our lives, our families, and our communities. Women and working people want results, and we are watching.

The will of the people matters, as does the truth. When Trump says he is defending women, what he really wants to do is turn back the clock and take away our freedoms and our opportunities. It’s that simple. This Women’s History Month, remember: It’s women who will defend women, not Trump.