Jennifer Palmieri writes:

“He did this for one reason and one reason only, to throw you off your game.” That’s what I told Hillary Clinton backstage at Washington University in October 2016, moments away from her second presidential debate with Donald Trump. Two days prior, the world had learned, thanks to the Access Hollywood tape, that Trump liked to assert power by assaulting women. Trump retaliated by showing up at a pre-debate appearance with women who had accused Bill Clinton of sexual assault. “Yeah, I got that,” Clinton responded dryly to my pep talk. “The great news is that it didn’t work,” I insisted. She had been through worse and I thought she would be okay, but it was my job, as the campaign’s communications director, to make sure of it. She mustered a serene smile, folded her hands, and slowly shook her head. “Nope. Didn’t work.”

Gretchen Whitmer, too, has dealt with boorish men, like one on the floor of the Michigan Senate who leaned over her to say something “very inappropriate.” The man was older, but she was the minority leader and senior to him. “Keep in mind, I outrank this guy, he’s looming over me, and of course, I am the one who has to go through all the mental gymnastics about how I respond to his offensive comment,” she said in a lament familiar to all women. She stood, waiting to speak until she could look him in the eye, and said forcefully but with a smile, “What the fuck is wrong with you? You can’t talk to me that way.”

Whitmer didn’t have the pressure of considering how millions of TV viewers—and voters—might judge her ability to withstand the pressure of being president on this interaction. (Clinton would later speculate that people might have liked to see some fire from her in responding to Trump pacing behind her on the debate stage, but in the moment what was most critical was for her to keep her cool.) For Whitmer, that encounter in the state Senate was seminal. She would not quietly tolerate misogynistic behavior as women before her had to do. Her lewd male colleague learned a lesson other foes—including Trump—would come to know: Whitmer doesn’t go looking for trouble, but if you come for her, she will punch you in the mouth.

It is a disservice to Whitmer that she is perhaps known more for outlandish things men have done to her—showing up at her home and office wielding guns, voting to strip her of her emergency powers to manage the pandemic, plotting to kidnap and assassinate her—than for her political acumen and what she has accomplished. But as a woman leader who came into the national spotlight during the Trump era, combating the torrent of misogynistic energy the 2016 campaign unleashed in the world has been a defining feature of Whitmer’s job. I see Whitmer battling the same forces Clinton faced but am encouraged. This time the men who tried to stop the woman are paying for their actions. Republican legislative leaders in Michigan who fought Whitmer lost control of the legislature. Many of the plotters are in jail. Even Trump—who tormented both Clinton and Whitmer—continues to face consequences as his legal troubles mount.

Whitmer recently commented that the country “is long overdue for a strong female chief executive”—begging the question of whether America will elect a woman front and center while asserting that a woman would do the job better than a man. And no, Whitmer is not planning a primary challenge to Joe Biden this time around. She will be busy raising money for Biden, however, along with 2024 House and Senate candidates, through her just-launched Fight Like Hell PAC.

I am not one of the people who buys into the self-actualizing bullshit that a woman can’t win the presidency. Clinton proved it’s possible. She got more votes. Having interviewed Whitmer for Showtime’s The Circus and based on my three decades in the political trenches, I could see she had the talent, drive, and toughness to be a solid national candidate. But earlier this year, I headed to Michigan to pressure-test that notion by observing how those qualities came to be and what all of it may say about Whitmer’s—or any woman’s—chances of being elected president. [Continue reading…]