Trump treats rules as restraints for other people, not for himself.
by Van Abbott
Guest Contributor
Seven stalls for women in a ballroom built for hundreds is no design flaw; it is a floor plan for male privilege.
This is not merely a fight over an oversized vanity project. It is a portrait of how Trump sees women: welcome in the room, useful to the image, never equal in power, access, or dignity.
The early ballroom plan reportedly allotted women only seven stalls. Someone measured the room, assigned the space, approved the priorities, and decided whose time mattered. Men enter. Men move. Women wait. The result is not neglect. It is a decision.
When the first architect reportedly objected to the bathrooms and to building-code concerns, Trump’s reported reply was blunt: “I am the code.”
That sentence explains more than the ballroom.
Trump treats rules as restraints for other people, criticism as insolence, and accountability as persecution.
Women reporters know it well. He called April Ryan a loser. He told PBS correspondent Yamiche Alcindor she had asked a racist question, then told her not to be “threatening.”
He mocked CNN’s Abby Phillip for what he called a stupid question. He branded CNN’s Kaitlan Collins a “nasty person,” scolded her for not smiling, told her she “shouldn’t be covering” him, and later labeled her a “sleazebag.” The names change. The method never does.
His hostility reaches Black women, brown women, and white women whenever they ask questions he cannot control. Black women hear their competence questioned. White women hear their looks and their right to report attacked.
Every woman who refuses to flatter him becomes the story. The questions were never the problem. The women asking them were.
The contempt extends to women who accuse him. More than two dozen have publicly accused Trump of sexual misconduct over several decades. Most allegations have not been litigated or proved, and Trump denies wrongdoing. But the pattern is not imaginary, and it does not vanish because he calls every critic a liar.
Consider E. Jean Carroll. A civil jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing and defaming her, and a second jury imposed tens of millions of dollars after he kept attacking her. He was not criminally convicted, and jurors did not find rape under New York’s particular statutory definition. They found abuse and defamation. That is a verdict, not a rumor.
The Epstein files pose a sharper question: why did Trump’s Justice Department, now led by Attorney General Todd Blanche, fight to keep raw FBI material hidden? In 2019, a woman told FBI agents that Epstein introduced her to Trump when she was between 13 and 15 years old, and that Trump sexually abused her and struck her.
Trump denies wrongdoing. The allegation is uncorroborated, unlitigated, and unproven in any court. Those limits matter. So does what came next.
Blanche’s department withheld related interview records as duplicative and resisted releasing the handwritten notes behind the FBI summaries. A federal judge ordered it to submit redacted and unredacted copies for confidential review, rejecting the argument that disclosure was unnecessary.
The notes may prove nothing. They may expose inconsistencies, corroborating leads, or details the formal reports omitted. The public does not know. That is the point. Americans deserve to know why an administration led by the accused man fought to keep the raw record hidden.
Secrecy is not exoneration.
Women know this bargain: speak up, risk humiliation, hear powerful men deny everything, then wait while evidence vanishes behind locked doors. The same hierarchy runs through the administration. Women have lost ground in senior roles, and departures of female Cabinet officials and appointees have concentrated authority in male hands. Each exit narrows the circle of voices willing to tell him no.
At the Pentagon, hostility toward women in combat has become policy. Pete Hegseth has pressed physical standards built on male benchmarks, telling women they must keep proving they belong in roles men inherit unchallenged. Standards should be demanding, match the job, and protect the troops. Standards engineered to push women out are exclusion disguised as strength. Trump chose Hegseth, empowers Hegseth, and owns the outcome. A country does not grow stronger by shrinking women’s space, silencing their questions, and hiding the records. It grows smaller, meaner, and afraid of the truth.
Seven stalls, one floor plan, and a president who calls himself the code: men get the space, women get the line, and accountability waits outside the door.
About the author ~
Van Abbott is a long time resident of Alaska and California. He has held financial management positions in government and private organizations in California, Kansas, and Alaska. He is retired and writes Op-Eds as a hobby. He served in the Peace Corps in the late sixties. You can find more of his commentaries and comments on
life in America on Substack.
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TAGS: Trump ballroom renovation ignores building codes, new Pentagon PFT standards raised for women, DOJ hides Epstein files despite orders, Donald Trump holds contempt for women who challenge him
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Visitors can watch live art demonstrations, including painting by Chris Logan, fiber demonstrations by the CU Spinners & Weavers Guild, candle making by Fire Doll Studio and community tufting by High in Fiber.
Families can enjoy face painting, balloon art, caricatures, bubbles, henna tattoos, an instrument petting zoo and a 70-foot inflatable obstacle course. Community organizations also will offer interactive activities.
There will be free live music on the Fall Fusion stage, along with a special dance performance by University of Illinois Dance in the Community students. The CU Circus Collective will present circus acts, hula hooping, aerial performances and fire dancing.
Visitors also can take part in a “Goblin Hunt” scavenger hunt, explore interactive photo opportunities and visit downtown businesses offering festival food specials and retail sales.
An event map at the Fall Fusion headquarters tent will help visitors find participating artists, activities and downtown specials.
The festival will close with a fire performance, providing a dramatic finale to Urbana’s kickoff to the fall season.
See the Facebook post below for more details.
