On Thursday night, Stephen Colbert delivered another great example of commentary that would be considered sexist were it not directed at a woman the Left detests.
Colbert sarcastically lauded Ivanka Trump for “assur[ing]” people in a Thursday interview with Axios that family separations are “giving her the feels.” After rolling a clip of Trump referring to the controversy as a personal “low point,” Colbert remarked, “But somehow I got through it by saying and doing nothing.”
That, of course, is not true. Through reporting, and the president’s own account, we know Ivanka Trump pressured him to take action on the matter. Downplaying her influence because she didn’t immediately make her disagreements public is cheap (especially since she’s argued that her public silence gives her more power and freedom to push back against her father’s less palatable policies in private).
Here’s what the eldest Trump daughter said in the interview that Colbert chalked up to “feels”:
That, of course, amounts to a senior White House official putting some daylight between herself and the administration. But Colbert still dismissed the answer as “feels.” He also dismissed her decision to agree the media is not the “enemy of the people,” misleadingly cutting the clip off early to slam her for not elaborating when she did, in fact, elaborate.
In response to another clip, this time of Trump saying that passage of tax reform legislation marked a “high point” for her, Colbert exclaimed, “You helped Republicans pass tax reform the way my nephew helps me mow the lawn with his bubble mower. Really? What did you do? What do you do?!”
Even Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., one of the president’s fiercest critics acknowledged that Ivanka Trump “played a big role in all that has happened relative to tax reform.”
“She deserves a lot of credit for what has happened,” he reflected in December.
Politico reported last October on the “extensive outreach program” she spearheaded to build support for the child tax credit. Trump poured months of time and effort into ensuring the expanded credit made it into the final bill.
I get that she’s mostly a political novice. I get that she used to hawk mediocre pumps. I get that she’s incredibly privileged. But the people applauding Colbert (HuffPost headline: “Stephen Colbert Delivers Blistering Takedown Of Ivanka Trump: ‘WHAT DO YOU DO?’”) would be excoriating the same attacks if they were directed at a woman whose politics they agreed with. The feminist Left’s consistent inability to live up to its own standards leaves those standards devoid of much credibility.
In less than five minutes, Colbert downplayed, minimized, and mocked the work of a female White House adviser (the “feels” line was particularly charged). Nobody should feel badly for Ivanka Trump, but anybody laughing along with Colbert, and everyone else who consistently deploys the same dismissive criticisms, should question whether his line of attack violates their own standards for how working women deserve to be treated by the media.
