# Will Americans Vote for a Man Who Is Now Widely Reported to Exude a Rancid Odor?  ## Metadata - Author:: [[Seth Abramson]] - Full Title:: Will Americans Vote for a Man Who Is Now Widely Reported to Exude a Rancid Odor? - Category: #articles - URL: https://sethabramson.substack.com/p/will-americans-vote-for-a-man-who?utm_medium=email&utm_source=multiple-personal-recommendations-email ## Highlights > So why is it, then, that the thing Trump seems to have *most* feared from the last month is a threat he [refuses to discuss at all](https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-odor-adam-kinzinger-b2468213.html)—contrary to his decades-long *modus operandi* of punching back at even the *smallest* and [most obscure](https://rollcall.com/2019/12/20/trump-punches-back-at-far-left-mainstream-christian-publication-after-editorial/) slight? To put a finer point on it, why are so many in America now talking about how Donald Trump *smells*, and why is Trump acting like this superficially puerile question is somehow political Kryptonite? ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcs1m18cxv28f3e95zkxvjy)) > And **Michael Cohen**, Trump’s longtime friend, fixer, attorney, and employee, has [insisted](https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1740495517946384434), apparently seriously, that Trump has been using an oddly performative story about a trans weightlifter as cover for evacuating his bowels into an adult diaper during public rallies ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcs87c6wn61hqq51jwjpeyj)) > For instance, on December 16, 2023, one of the two Republican members of the **House January 6 Committee**, **Adam Kinzinger**, [tweeted](https://okmagazine.com/p/donald-trump-kicked-out-steakhouse-nyc-odor-tiktoker-claims/) that he was **“genuinely surprised how people close to Trump haven’t talked about [his] odor. It’s truly something to behold. Wear a mask if you can [when close to him].”** ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcs99xsb07cqxc51f78z0qb)) > **Defector** [reports](https://defector.com/did-donald-trump-fart-while-attempting-to-commit-election-fraud)—with an audio embed that is, candidly, quite compelling—that in the midst of one of the most infamous and melodramatically illegal phone calls of his presidency, his felonious early 2021 [call](https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/03/politics/trump-brad-raffensperger-phone-call-transcript/index.html) attempting to get Georgia Secretary of State **Brad Raffensperger** to steal the 2020 presidential vote in Georgia for him, the angry then-president farted loudly on multiple occasions. As the digital media outlet wrote, memorably, of Trump’s loud pre-insurrection rip, **“It sound[ed] like someone blowing into a French horn full of chowder.”** (The incident was [also reported out](https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=228530915518036) by a **CBC** program, which indicated that the sound in question, which Trump can immediately be heard apologizing for, is unquestionably a fart.) ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcs9q0g1h8e0v81ce3agn5t)) > As the ***New Yorker*** [reports](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/on-and-off-the-avenue/the-literal-stink-of-the-trump-apocalypse), Trump has long equated how someone smells with their value as a human being, telling a reporter in 2012 (the year reports indicate Trump decided to run for president in 2016) that **“sometimes I smell things on people that… make [me] not like them.”** A decade later—now well into his political career—Trump would be an old hand at equating smell and value, [declaring](https://abc7.com/donald-trump-beverly-hills-smell-showers/13846924/) of certain Californians, particularly the rich ones most likely to fund Democratic causes, **“rich people from Beverly Hills generally speaking don’t smell so good. Their hygiene is not good. So when you meet somebody with a beautiful house in Beverly Hills, you know that person is sort of disgusting under there.”** (**ABC News** has since [debunked](https://abc7.com/donald-trump-beverly-hills-smell-showers/13846924/) the bizarre conspiracy theory that seems to have prompted Trump to make this offensive remark.) ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsagjpafjbyavf7z8e3h8v)) > A second subtopic we could turn to, in answering the question of whether it’s gauche to comment on a politician’s smell, is this one: does smell matter to *voters* as a matter of political science? > And the answer, it turns out, is a qualified yes. > The “yes” here is a “qualified” one because it turns out that one political demographic *in particular* is likely to refuse to vote for any politician who smells bad. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsg0rfvhyy941ey2dkkha5)) > That demographic is Donald Trump supporters. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsg6j6zrzmr6q52qbpq06d)) > As **The New Scientist** [reported](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2162285-if-you-hate-bad-body-odour-youre-more-likely-to-support-trump/) in 2018, data research reveals that **“the more easily disgusted a person is, the more they are likely to support Donald Trump.”** Not only do **“people who are socially conservative seem to feel disgust more strongly”** and **“people who score[ ] higher for disgust [on digitally delivered tests] also tend[ ] to score more highly for right wing authoritarianism”**, but Swedish researcher **Jonas Olofsson** found specifically that **“Those that are most supportive of Donald Trump have the highest body odor disgust sensitivity.”** ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsghndtejhjmpgtxqgcp01)) > **University of Toronto** researcher **Yoel Inbar** has compiled data that confirms that “**People who are more disgust sensitive are more socially right wing….[disgust sensitivity] tells us…about social traditionalism, or whether someone voted Republican or Democrat.”** ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsgwc1j6jtb6ee32t3qh0b)) > This may be one of two reasons—the other being that Trump generally smells bad—that Trump does something astonishing for him when his scent is raised in public: refuses to engage at all ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsh7t53nw670mbttmj4mqy)) > We come, now, to an overarching question: is the allegation that Trump has a putrid odor an appropriate topic for *journalism*? And does the answer to this question change if it turns out—as certainly seems to be the case—that accusations that Trump has some sort of inescapable personal hygiene issue appear to be the thing that scares him more than anything else his opponents in the political arena have ever thrown at him? ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsjd5nk6mgyxmvv2yf97s0)) > But the grounds for using Trump’s odor as a *political weapon* are even more specific than this. During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump has already done all of the following: > 1. [Made his opponent’s age a key campaign issue](https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-mocks-bidens-age-gaffes-deals-blunders/story?id=104510199), despite his opponent being only three and a half years older than him and both men being in their fourth quarter-century of life; > 2. [made his opponent’s physical condition a key campaign issue](https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4189605-trump-biden-running-body-is-shot-mind-worse/), despite it being more or less uncontested in major media or mainstream discourse that President **Joe Biden** is in [markedly better physical health](https://www.publicnotice.co/p/kevin-kruse-2024-campaign-biden-trump-age) than his likely 2024 Republican opponent; > 3. [made his opponent’s medical history an issue](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/11/joe-biden-mental-health-pro-trump-campaign), under circumstances in which Trump has been found—both before his time in office and after—to have [hidden](https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-pains-hide-medical-record-equating-sickness-weakness/story?id=73461013) and [falsified](https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/05/02/607638733/doctor-trump-dictated-letter-attesting-to-his-extraordinary-health) his medical records on repeated occasions (including [using falsified medical records to dodge](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/26/us/politics/trump-vietnam-draft-exemption.html) the **Vietnam War** draft); > 4. formed [both implicit and explicit political alliances with far-right demagogues](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/07/us/politics/alex-jones-jan-6-trump.html) like **Alex Jones** who are infamous for weaponizing [grotesquely false and absurd allegations](https://www.cnn.com/2016/10/12/politics/obama-sulfur-smell-alex-jones/index.html), immediately before the 2016 presidential election, that Democratic presidential candidates who Trump built his entire political career on attacking—**Barack Obama** and Hillary Clinton—**“both smell like** **sulfur”** (see video below); > 5. [made his supposedly superior genetics a political issue](https://time.com/4936612/donald-trump-genes-genetics/), a dubious, unseemly, and even eugenics-adjacent campaign boast that could not be sustained if he had one or multiple persistent medical conditions that since the 1980s have caused him to emit a foul odor over which he has minimal or variable control; and > 6. made his supposedly uncontested **“alpha male”** status [the implicit centerpiece of his political persona](https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/10/14/why-is-anyone-sticking-with-trump-his-alpha-male-appeal/), such that his political standing—particularly among those members of his base who [report to pollsters](https://news.gallup.com/poll/216260/trump-scores-highest-strong-leader-less.aspx) that they see him as a **“strong leader”**—could be grievously wounded by the revelation that he is physically repulsive to all those around him. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsm2mcte8c1c3e0xx825g0)) > In short, *if* Donald Trump consistently smells of his own uncontrollably evacuated bowels, it’s likely not a new development—thus, not one linked to his age—and could indicate not just personal habits and/or medical conditions he has hidden from voters but a course of deceit upon which his entire political persona has long depended. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsn7zp66mma5gtprbm7dbh)) > But in her post-**White House** memoir *I’ll Take Your Questions Now: What I Saw at the Trump White House* (**Harper**, 2021), former White House Press Secretary **Stephanie Grisham** [reveals](https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/574309-new-book-sheds-light-on-trumps-mysterious-walter-reed-visit-in/) that Trump’s trip to Walter Reed was for a *colonoscopy*—a procedure [ordinarily](https://www.asahq.org/madeforthismoment/preparing-for-surgery/procedures/colonoscopy/#:~:text=to%20three%20hours.-,Does%20a%20colonoscopy%20hurt%3F,asleep%20for%20the%20entire%20procedure.) conducted with a degree of sedation or anesthesia applied, and one that would’ve forced Trump to transfer presidential powers to Vice President **Mike Pence**. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsrt06ej2tndvrvmaznh6d)) > People who’ve spent considerable time around Donald Trump confirm that he smells awful—and have said as much on the record—though the cause of the stench is only sometimes stated with clarity. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmcsyt18mxj3sm2rya88xwhm)) > As **International Business Times** [reports](https://www.ibtimes.sg/trump-often-soiled-his-pants-apprentice-show-wore-diapers-claims-comedian-noel-casler-53721), Casler says in no uncertain terms that Trump’s addiction to fast food and Adderall has caused him to become chronically incontinent, and that he’s had this problem since *at least* the 1990s—a duration that may explain why [the late Dr. Bornstein](https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/14/harold-bornstein-trump-ex-doctor-dies-459293) (notably, a [gastroenterologist](https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/14/harold-bornstein-trump-ex-doctor-dies-459293)) implied to the *New York Times* that Trump had been getting regular colonoscopies since the 1980s ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmct0kpd5xcgsedmp4e5w4jt)) > Per Casler, the result is not just that Trump must wear adult undergarments, but that on regular occasion during lengthy public events he soils himself in a way that those around him cannot possibly miss. Here’s what Casler—a [musician, writer, comedian, and actor who is now a podcaster and political commentator](https://www.wypr.org/community-calendar/event/comedian-and-political-commentator-noel-casler)—says (video thereafter): > > *[My allegation regarding Trump wearing diapers] is not a joke. It’s **Depends** [brand adult undergarments].* > > > > *[I know] **“Diaper Don”** is trending, but it’s based in reality.* > > > > *He would often soil himself on the Apprentice set. He’s incontinent from all the speed—all the **Adderall** he does, the **cocaine** he’s done for decades. All that staff has a laxative; it has an effect on your bowels. And his are uncontrollable.* > > > > *He’s worn diapers since probably the nineties, but I saw it firsthand in the 2000s, on Celebrity Apprentice—in the late 2000s. We’d have to stop the show and change hi[s] [diapers].* > > > > *That was [former Trump bodyguard] **Keith Schiller**’s job. He would take him off-set [and] he would wipe him down. Our nickname for Keith was **“Wet Wipes.”** [This] is not a joke; it’s happened several times.* > > > > *You’ve [also] seen it happen while he’s in office. You’ve seen when he was in the **Oval Office** with [Turkish President Recep] Erdogan and you could clearly hear him evacuating himself.* > > > > *He did it in front of [the late] Senator **Dianne Feinstein** [D-CA] at a press conference.* > > > > *So he does it and he almost sits there [with his eyes wide] and unaware of it. One time I saw **Ivanka** have to go kind of whisper in his ear and then Keith came and took him off-stage.* > > > > *He’ll also do it in a rage. And this is where it gets really drug-related. He’ll start to freak out. One time there was the word **“arbitrage”** on a cue card, and he started screaming that the script department was setting him up—**“You’re setting me up!”**—and he just freaked out and then very loudly evacuated his bowels. You could smell it. And the guy who was holding the boom mike was tearing up.* > > > > *So that’s where the nickname—**“Shitshow”**—came from; that was the crew nickname for Celebrity Apprentice. So when you hear [people online say] “Diaper Don,” it’s not a joke.* > > > > *He tries to hide it, [but] I’ll give you one more fact: if you look up the video of him when he was doing the **WWF** [**Wrestlemania**] thing, he tackles a guy [his friend **Vince McMahon**] on the ground outside of the [wrestling] ring and you can clearly see the outline of the Depends in his pants.* ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmct1jyxwf85m7n6ry4dz12h)) > Noel Casler isn’t the only longtime friend and co-worker of Donald Trump who has gone public about Trump’s chronic incontinence and the stench that results from it. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmct5yx6ttzktrjbza5bpndt)) > **Donald has a distinct smell that doesn’t really get enough press. It’s like body odor with kind of like a scented, makeup product. You can smell the hair products even outdoors”**, Griffin said, which caused Mary Trump to cringe ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmct73brzxde9k4znyce25y1)) > Here is the **Billboard Music Award**-, **Clio Award**-, W**ebby Award**-, and **MTV Music Award**-winning musician **Moby** (also a many-time **Grammy** nominee) revealing way back in 2016 that *more than one* **“friend”** of his who had **“worked for Trump”** didn’t just idly say but **“swore”** to the celebrated artist that **“[Trump] wears adult diapers.”** ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmct8nyaj2j0fwyea3gpv7g4)) > Trump has now [regularly called for real and perceived domestic political opponents](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/11/13/trump-threaten-punish-enemies-president/) to be [jailed or executed](https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/nancy-pelosi-donald-trump-mark-milley-b2418458.html), so in addition to all the reasons this report has already provided for journalists and voters to take a reasonable interest in Trump’s medical conditions and how they may be hinted at by his odor of putrefaction, it must also be noted that speaking honestly about whether a would-be dictator arguably [already responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans from a treatable virus](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0020731420960345) wears adult diapers is playing by **Marquis de Queensberry** [rules](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marquess_of_Queensberry_Rules) rather than the ones that Trump himself has laid down. (Many experts say Trump’s body count [is in the hundreds of thousands](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/10/us-coronavirus-response-donald-trump-health-policy) rather than the thousands ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmct9e1rcmpnntyygs48enx9)) > As for Keith Schiller, the man who Casler has alleged was responsible for cleaning the former reality show star and president when he unexpectedly evacuated his bowels in public, it may be worth noting that in late 2017 the **Republican National Committee** suddenly began [paying Schiller](https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/21/trumps-ex-bodyguard-makes-15000-a-month-from-a-gop-slush-fund.html) an exorbitant amount of money—via an RNC **“slush fund”**—for no valid business reason anyone has ever been able to readily discern (the idea appears to be that Schiller, a bodyguard, is providing the Republican Party with professional **“security consulting services”** at a time it has countless far better options for such work). As soon as Trump left office and could no longer be politically hurt by any allegations of incontinence (or [the marital improprieties Schiller is known to have witnessed](https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-trump-fixer-who-knows-where-all-the-bodies-are-buried)), the RNC’s massive payments to Schiller—which, by then, totaled *well over half a million dollars*—[immediately ceased](https://www.forbes.com/sites/zacheverson/2021/06/09/rnc-paid-trumps-former-bodyguard-585500-over-four-years/?sh=5ce9c6194260). ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctag84dvn62qv6vs6tdpd8)) > As for the tweet, it’s already been briefly alluded to here. On December 16, 2023, the now-retired Republican congressman **Adam Kinzinger** (R-IL) tweeted, of Trump, that his **“odor”** is **“something to behold”**—and that those in close proximity to him should *want* to wear a mask. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctbgkegd483rdh1vmaev05)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctk1qr1cqbh7rwvs3f7ckn)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctk6jgfwzmgcqnn6348j5g)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctkata0pcw8dymvb611n5d)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctkgfhz4eb91x0yqhk7e00)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctm2kqsea5rmy1ygk39xb1)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctmbvgjxje5f9smnk0r7w6)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctmhvn459s7a64gaddn1qc)) > Yes, the apparent fact that Donald Trump is chronically flatulent, incontinent, and just generally smelly in a way that’s deeply upsetting to all those around him—from friends to coworkers, foreign leaders to even some admirers—is now much more a part of everyday U.S. political debate than those on the political left would ever have imagined or wished. But this isn’t even the hundredth or thousandth most surprising shift in U.S. political debate over the last decade, and nearly all of the worst ones on any such list we might imagine were gleefully authored by Donald Trump himself. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctntwajyjt64hyj743e7bv)) >  ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hmctp4nm57mg4w08kgkvn1vb))