The #MeToo Movement celebrated its first birthday in October 2018. One year earlier, the hashtag went viral on social media in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein sexual allegations. In the 24 hours after the initial tweet, there were 12 million online references to the topic of sexual abuse as women worldwide shared their own sexual abuse stories. As an international conversation on the issue unfolded, the gender aspects of Donald Trump’s policy agenda came under increased scrutiny. This, combined with the president’s personal history of sexually inappropriate behaviour and allegations made against him, added fuel to the burning culture wars fire.

Donald Trump has never been mistaken for a feminist. As #MeToo ignited an angry conversation about power dynamics and male sexual behaviour, the chorus of protest against the President and the patriarchy grew increasingly loud. This is not to say that there was growing dissatisfaction with how President Trump was doing his job. His public approval ratings have hovered consistently in the low 40s throughout autumn 2018. For a candidate who won 46.4% of the popular vote in the 2016 presidential election, this suggests that almost everyone who voted for the maverick candidate still supports him.

For many GOP supporters, he is delivering on campaign promises with aplomb. Most presidents would be thrilled with a couple of supreme court appointments during their two terms in office. To have achieved this after a mere 20 months is a coup indeed. Replacing the socially conservative Antonin Scalia with Neil Gorsuch was a fairly predictable choice, process and outcome. The same could hardly be said for Anthony Kennedy’s successor. The toxic partisan battle that took place during the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation was akin to an earlier, equally distasteful moment in the ongoing culture wars, that of the Clarence Thomas appointment in 1991. For many women (and men), witnessing the appointment of a possible sexual predator to the highest court in the land, by a president himself accused of sexual assault was a travesty, not to mention a demonstration of patriarchal impunity. Legitimacy and integrity are key to supreme court appointments, and for some, Kavanaugh had neither.

Much has been made of Kavanaugh’s voting past, not least on the issue of abortion. Pro-choice Americans are fearful of what may happen to Roe V Wade on his watch. An imminent reversal of the 1973 ruling seems unlikely but the judge’s past writings suggest that he is in favour of more strict regulation, along with tighter restrictions for physicians