Around this time last year, I wrote about how the right is selling young women a story about why life feels hard and what they're offering as the solution.
So I was curious to see the reports of this year’s TPUSA women’s leadership summit now that Erika Kirk is fully in charge of the organization, slightly complicating their previous argument against women in positions of power (not that hypocrisy has ever stopped them, but whatever.)
You can read about it on NPR, the Nation, and Politico — I particularly liked Elaine Godfrey of the Atlantic’s story and Kara Voght (formerly of the Washington Post, now at the WSJ)’s recounting.
The gist seems to be: While Charlie Kirk went hard on the argument that if you’re single, you’re a failure to the movement, Erika softened the message, saying explicitly “Your marital status is not God’s report card.” There was lots of beef tallow, an excessive amount of floral prints, and an omnipresent reminder that feminism is evil and must be resisted.
One thing that has come up in every article about the event: For an explicitly political organization, that was very little explicit discussion of politics.
I didn’t hear a single speaker allude, even casually, to the upcoming midterm elections, or attempt to rally women to prevent a Republican shellacking in November. Instead, this once-doctrinaire and overtly political women’s conference felt more like a Christian women’s-empowerment seminar—set not in a state with one of the country’s most closely watched Senate races but instead on a remote island where elections don’t exist.
There wasn’t a MAGA hat in sight at the Marriott in downtown San Antonio—not on women’s heads, not for sale among the dozens of vendors inside the exhibition hall. … The only Trump administration officials present were former press secretaries, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Fox News host Kayleigh McEnany. The only mention of the current president was in passing. The only nod to the midterms came from buttons on offer in the foyer: “Pretty girls don’t vote for socialists.”
It’s baffling upon first read — but nearly 3,000 of the most engaged women in conservative politics in a room and no one actually mentioning politics is not an accident.
TPUSA wasn’t built to just win elections — it was built to create identity and give people a space for belonging. If they do that well, winning elections is just one of many things that becomes possible.
There is no comparable Democratic or left-leaning/left-adjacent institution that shows up for young women (or really, anyone!) in non-election years just to hang out and be together.1 There simply aren’t the resources for one (nor is there a singular vision of femininity or womanhood to align around.) But clearly there is a value in it if we could find a way to make it work: TPUSA institutionalizes the kind of relationships that last beyond Trump.
I’m reading about the summit and thinking about all this — and how the pro-democracy side struggles to build a sense of community — as I watch the Knicks celebrations happening around New York City. (Bear with me on this…)
I don’t think I’ve ever watched a full basketball game. I don’t say this from a place of judgment — I used to be a huge baseball fan until the Nationals won the World Series in 2020 and then I basically stopped watching, knowing it would never get better than that.
Basketball simply isn’t my sport, and at this particular moment in my life, I don’t really have the emotional capacity to add another thing to care a lot about.
So while I haven’t watched any of the games live, I have consumed hours upon hours of footage of people celebrating the Knicks victories.
I cannot get enough. Give me every single clip of parents hugging their kids, of people storming the streets, of games projected onto the sides of apartment buildings and crowds gathered outside bodegas and fans losing their shit as they climb on top of lightpoles in midtown. I want the pure, unadulterated joy.
The vibes in New York over the last few weeks have been immaculate and a huge part of that is the Knicks, which really have captured the city’s imagination.
(But also: The warm weather after a truly miserable winter feels hard-earned. That Mamdani has exceeded expectations and brought a sense of optimism and levity to leadership in the midst of all the doom-and-gloom on the national level is like an antidote to despair. The World Cup is imminent, and people seem pretty hyped about that, too.)
Whatever the reason: There is a feeling as you move through the city that you are part of something bigger. There is a sense of camaraderie and shared identity. There are Go New York Go New York Go chants on subway cars and Knicks jerseys on toddlers and dogs alike.
I am not a longstanding and long-suffering Knicks fan2, but I’m a fan of Knicks fans3 — and more than that, I love this city in a way that feels cliche and sappy. And I love when people lean all the way in and find earnest delight in something together, without irony or artifice.
I imagine that is akin to what those women at the TPUSA Women’s Leadership Summit felt, too.
Married or single, working or staying at home, moms or not, those conservative women came together in the sickly pink ballrooms of that hotel in San Antonio to feel like they belonged somewhere. They were given a story they could see themselves in. They had uniforms (floral prints and cream dresses), they had mantras (holistic, empowered, redeemed,), and of course, they had merch (so much merch.)
Don’t get me wrong, the Knicks are good (at least, for now) and spark so much joy. TPUSA is bad and mostly makes me furious — and I am extremely tempted to mock them.
And in many ways, they are so so mockable, and more importantly, dangerous for the future of our country.
But I understand why the women are there, in the same way I understand why someone might spend their life savings on game 4 tickets: When everything feels hard, you grab on to the joy wherever you can find it.
When We’re in Charge is my leadership book for millennials and gen Z trying to do things differently. Pick up a copy in any format you’d like — hardcover, e-book, or audio book (narrated by yours truly) anywhere you get books, including Amazon or Bookshop.org or literally anywhere else. If you have Spotify Premium, you can listen to for free right this very minute. It’ll be out in paperback in September. And alert: The Kindle version is on sale this month for $3.99!
There are certainly some institutions that do this, especially within the Divine Nine/HBCU network, but those are more specific in scope and less political in aim.
Although, obviously: Knicks in five!
This is very similar to my relationship to the Eras Tour and Taylor Swift. I am not a Swiftie, I would never have paid for a concert ticket. However I LOVE Swifties, love the fandom, and watched so so so much Eras Tour content.
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