President Donald Trump has successfully thwarted one of his greatest fears, journalist Molly Jong-Fast argued in an op-ed published in The New York Times Sunday, but one celebrity appeared to stand alone in weaponizing that fear against him.
That fear, Jong-Fast argued, was that of celebrities undermining his messaging through fierce public condemnations. However, as she observed earlier this month while covering the Tony Awards in New York City, many celebrities remain paralyzed with “fear” of retribution from the president.
“I could feel the fear,” Jong-Fast wrote. “The celebrities I spoke to were clearly worried that the views they had advertised just a few years earlier could cause them to be on the wrong side of a MAGA internet mob or a [FCC Chair] Brendan Carr call-out or a profitable film franchise’s hiring decisions. If they mentioned politics at all, they would gingerly nibble around its edges.”
Jong-Fast acknowledged the criticism celebrity resistance had garnered over the years, noting it’s frequently been “mocked as trivial.”
“Who cares what actors or pop stars think about politics?” Jong-Fast rhetorically asked before answering herself: “The president does.”
“Celebrities are the only people who can dominate the algorithm with the same power as him, making them best poised to undermine the president’s otherwise overwhelming messaging,” Jong-Fast wrote.
“We look to our cultural figures to show us how to fight back against the pressure to stay silent, to give us the words to say that what we’re seeing isn’t normal. When speaking up actually means risking something, for once, it is more necessary than ever.”
And the one celebrity she encountered who appeared to weaponize that fear more than anyone was an old foe of the president’s.
“Then, with a new face and the same old gleeful crankiness, Rosie O’Donnell appeared,” Jong-Fast wrote.
“She told me she was coming back to America to do a one-woman show, and – despite having fled to Ireland upon Mr. Trump’s election to a second term – said she’s not afraid at all. Later, she texted me, ‘It’s the duty of all Americans to speak out against this fascist criminal administration – free speech – use it or lose it.’”