Feminist Politics and Resistance in the Trump 2.0 Era
by Rachel Marie Davis
Introduction
Following the 2024 electoral loss of Kamala Harris to Donald Trump, the question “so, what now?” has reverberated through circles concerned with equality in the United States. This contribution is concerned with the progression of feminism under Trump’s second term. For the purpose of this essay, feminism can be defined as the belief in the social, economic, and political equality of the sexes. By outlining feminist responses to Trump over the past decade, this essay examines feminist strategies that failed to resonate with the public at large, but also results from the 2025 elections that should guide progressive American leaders through victory.
Anger as Feminist Resistance
Back in 2016, when Trump won his first election against female contender Hillary Clinton, the initial response by feminists can be described with one word: anger. In reaction, feminists organized the peaceful protest Women’s March in Washington D.C. for the day after the first inauguration of Trump. This March served as a backlash against Trump’s misogynistic rhetoric. I was lucky enough to attend this event in Washington D.C. and can affirm the feelings of anger and frustration that circulated through the crowd. Signs showed slogans that express such feelings, like “Enough is Enough,” “This Pussy Grabs Back,” or “If you are not angry, you are not paying attention!” These slogans foregrounded the basis of feminism for the following years as anger became the central political response and form of resistance.

People line up on Central Park West as they wait for the start of the Women’s March in New York. Craig Ruttle/AP. (CNN 2018).
The atmosphere of collective anger among American feminists did not solely remain in political marches but quickly infiltrated cultural production as well. Literary and media trends in the US signaled the growth of “female rage” in the following years, with novels like My Year of Rest and Relaxation (2018) by Ottessa Moshfegh and films likePromising Young Woman (2020) directed by Emerald Fennell reaching undeniable success. The success of such “female rage” centric narratives signaled a broader cultural appetite for the cathartic expression of moral transgression. This being said, the following election results from 2024 have revealed the limits of a symbolic feminist resistance, conveying that cultural expressions of “female rage” have not translated into sustainable political action. Importantly, this is largely due to anger being a damaging attribute to female candidates. During Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign, Trump labeled her as “shrill” (Ghitis 2016). In the 2020 election, the Democratic party saw several female candidates face similar sexist labels, falling victim to the “shrill” and “shrieking” stereotypes that fall upon passionate women. Then of course, in 2024, Kamala Harris faced similar misogynistic critique, from her laugh to her demeanor, further conveying how emotional expressiveness continues to be weaponized against women in positions of political authority. This suggests that cultural expressions of “female rage” do not translate into sustainable political movements.
Feminism After Roe
Feminist efforts in Trump 2.0 should be focused entirely on material and tangible solutions for economic inequality and reproductive injustice. The centrality of neoliberal feminism over the past decade has focused largely on a theoretical approach to gender equality while ignoring a grassroots approach to reaching structural reform. Neoliberal feminism, defined broadly, emphasizes individual empowerment and professional corporate success for women. Neoliberal feminism tends to emphasize representational inclusivity while ignoring the material conditions that shape women’s lives. The failures of neoliberal feminism can be broadly examined through abortion’s failure to secure Kamala Harris the presidency in 2024.
With the overturn of Roe in 2022, abortion is unavailable in 14 states (Ephross and Nash 2022). For women needing an abortion, travelling to a different state is necessary. Many of the states with abortion bans are clustered together meaning patients are forced to travel across more than one state for care (Ephross and Nash 2022). Naturally, this fact adds hundreds if not thousands of dollars onto the cost of an abortion. This financial barrier can be impossible to overcome for patients of low economic standing, patients of color, young patients, and LGBTQ individuals (Ephross and Nash 2022). In addition to lack of access to abortions, women in states with abortion bans are at a significantly higher risk of severe health complications and maternal mortality. In Texas alone, three women have died under the new, restrictive abortion ban as doctors fear prosecution for safer miscarriage treatments (Presser and Surana 2024). Previously, reproductive rights were widely framed as a decisive feminist issue, and despite the harrowing facts just presented, abortion failed to win Kamala Harris the presidency. In seven states, Trump received the nomination and the right to abortion was embedded in their state constitutions, thereby showing abortion was not the most important issue to voters (Shamim 2024). Many political analysts have agreed that the economy simply mattered more. In the paper “The 2024 Presidential Election: Public Opinion on the Economy and Immigration Helped Return Trump to the White House, but with No Clear Policy Mandate” by Sara M. Kirshbaum, et al. from the journal The Forum, scholars conclude that voters thought Trump would do better at top-of-mind issues: immigration and the economy (Kirshbaum et al., 2025). Prof. Johannes Völz from Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main states the following analysis of Harris’s loss: “One widespread theory states that Kamala Harris campaigned on the wrong issues. Instead of focusing on people’s financial hardship, especially of those on low incomes, she concentrated on saving democracy and the law on abortion” (Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main 2024). This signals a crucial failure in contemporary feminist strategies employed by Harris. Reproductive rights should not be mobilized in isolation from broader material or economic concerns such as inflation, housing, and childcare that impacts women’s everyday life. Economic precarity possibly overrode all other political concerns in the 2024 election.
The reality of Trump’s second term is grave, but, as written by Emily E. LB. Twarog, “we need to use this moment to resist and not mourn” (Twarog 2025). Instead of sinking into a pool of despair and cynicism, now it is more important than ever for feminists to continue fighting for women’s rights, and at this point, women’s lives. Perhaps a paradigm shift is called for, moving away from feminism rooted in elite institutions and shifting the broad focus of feminist efforts onto the everyday lived experience of women.
Looking Forward: A Feminism For Everyone
So, what should this fight look like in 2026 and onwards? Favorably, Election Night 2025 provided memorable and inspiring outcomes for feminists across the US. Abigail Spanberger was elected Virginia’s first woman governor, while Mikie Sherill became New Jersey’s first Democratic woman governor (Terrell 2025). In addition to these gubernatorial successes, women claimed historic wins across the board. Detroit, Syracuse, Albany, and St. Paul also welcomed female mayors (Terrell 2025). Zohran Mamdani’s New York City mayoral win against Andrew Cuomo also marks an achievement for the feminist movement considering Cuomo disgracefully resigned from his governor position in 2021 due to multiple sexual harassment allegations (Barney 2025). Moreover, Mamdani is taking Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s statement, “women belong in all places where decisions are made” seriously, as his transition team is all-female (Barney 2025).
All three successful, feminist nominees ran on material resolutions to aid their female constituents. Mamdani, Sherill, and Spanberger all focused their campaigns on affordability and increasing access to affordable early education, with Mamdani suggesting free childcare in NYC (Villanueva 2025). The high cost of everyday life in the United States disproportionately burdens women, particularly mothers, caregivers, and working-class women. By centering affordability, public education, and childcare, these candidates signaled a move away from purely representational feminism towards a materially grounded feminist politics.

Assembly member Zohran Mamdani attends a news conference on universal child care at Columbus Park Playground on Nov. 19, 2024, in New York City. Photo: Laëtitia Vitaud, Nov 27, 2025.
These electoral successes suggest that a materially grounded feminist platform resonates more effectively with voters than purely representational ideas. With the 2026 midterm elections approaching, feminist candidates must examine the shortcomings of Kamala Harris’s campaign as already mentioned. The centrist, “Wall Street-approved” campaign from Harris left working-class women behind. According to a survey of female voters conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation and published on October 11 2024, the top issue that emerged for women voters overall was inflation, including rising household expenses (Shamim 2024). Instead of addressing concerns of working-class women, Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney to attract moderate Republicans, ignoring affordability and thereby alienating working class women, which possibly lost her the presidency altogether. Independent Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders enunciates that “it should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party, which has abandoned working-class people should find that the working class has abandoned them” (Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main 2024). Moreover, The Nation provides a substantiated examination of this claim in the article “Liz Cheney Was an Electoral Fiasco for Kamala Harris” by John Nichols. By closely surveying the election results in Wisconsin, Nichols concludes that Harris failed to win over conservative or undecided voters while sacrificing valuable campaign time that could have been spent mobilizing work-class constituencies (Nichols 2024). The Cheney strategy can represent how overinvesting in elite politics undermined the development of a platform that would have directly addressed material conditions and affordability concerns for working-class women.
With all of this being said, progressive nominees must not throw their transgender allies under the bus, either. While 2028 White House bid hopefuls Gov. Gavin Newson and Secretary Pete Buttigieg have both touted there is a serious fairness issue to have trans athletes compete in women’s sports (Becker 2025), successful Democratic nominees in 2025 did not abandon their transgender constituents. Samantha Riedel outlines this point succinctly in their article “Election Night Proved Democrats Don’t Need to Abandon Trans People to Win” (Riedel 2025). Riedel mentions the election of Mamdani, Sherill, and Spanberger and how the three candidates repudiated their challenger’s blatant transphobia. For Spanberger in Virginia, her opponent latched on to Trump’s campaign saying “Kamala Is For They/Them” by bringing it up in the gubernatorial debate and spending more than $2 million on anti-trans ads, but lost in a dramatic landslide winning only 42% of the vote (Riedel 2025).
Conclusion
In conclusion, this essay outlined a “Feminist Playbook” for the 2026 midterm elections and for the general future of the feminist movement in the United States under Trump 2.0. While feminist anger served as a necessary response to Trump 1.0, the failure of Kamala Harris’s campaign in 2024 demonstrates the limits of symbolic resistance. The feminist success in 2025 paved by Mamdani, Sherill, and Spanberger suggest a clear path forward; a feminism grounded in affordability, childcare, public education, and economic security resonates more deeply with voters than symbolic, representational politics on gender equality.
About the Author
Rachel Marie Davis is a doctoral candidate in American Studies at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) München. She studied Political Science at Hanover College, USA and received her Master of Arts in American Studies from LMU München. Her dissertation project examines representations of women in post-#MeToo American fiction, with particular attention to the female rage aesthetic and the reimagining of Gothic literary elements in contemporary fiction.
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OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Rachel M. Davis (January 28, 2026). Feminist Politics and Resistance in the Trump 2.0 Era. HCA Graduate Blog. Retrieved May 11, 2026 from https://doi.org/10.58079/15l4p
