Today, Explained - Mar-a-Lago makeover

Episode Date: April 18, 2025

There is a very distinct “look” many people in the MAGA world have adopted, and comedian Suzanne Lambert is making a career calling it out. Mother Jones senior editor Inae Oh says it’s bigger than bronzer. This episode was produced by Gabrielle Berbey, edited by Amina Al-Sadi, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Andrea Kristinsdottir and Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem at the White House. Photo by Ken Cedeno/UPI/Bloomberg via Getty Images. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are not doing this because you enjoy it. You're doing this because you're trying to fulfill a weird obligation to like the patriarchy. Oh, okay. Oh, look at you. Oh, yep. That's perfect. It doesn't match your undertones. Yeah, we don't have attention to detail over here, as evidenced by certain group chats. Am I going to look less crazy at some point? No. You kind of look intense too, actually Okay so I just added some muddy bronzer. Cool. Okay. You know when you're filming glam videos with Border Patrol you can't always bring all your tools with you so this is very authentic to how they might do it in the car for example. I accidentally just colored in my entire eyelid. That's fine they love eyeliner over there. I hit my eyeball. Oh no. It's okay, I'll make it. I look like I'm ready to go vote to take away my own rights.

Hi, we're doing Mar-a-Lago makeovers on Today Explained. Join us. My parents have had a lot of time on their hands lately. At first, it was nice. Hey mom, can you drive me to soccer practice? Sure can. We're having slow cooked ribs for dinner. It was awesome. And then it became a lot.

Some friends are coming over to watch a movie. Ooh, what are we watching? I'll make some popcorn. Thanks to Voila, they can order all our fresh favorites from Sobeez, Farmboy, and Longos online, which is super reliable. And now my parents are reliable. A little too reliable. Voila! Your groceries delivered just like that.

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It was a video that I filmed on such a whim. Hey, I noticed that all of the Republican girlies in my comments do their makeup the exact same gorgeous way. So I thought that I would try to do it myself. It took me all of 10 minutes to record, edit and post where I was on vacation for my birthday. And I was just pissed off and feeling hopeless after the election. Starting with the base, I'm not gonna do any prep at all.

We really want our makeup to cling to any dry spots and accentuate any texture that we might have. And seeing the way that people were messaging online, it was like, I'm not out here to spread like hate, you know, or else you're spread love. So please be respectful and be kind to each other because the person who sits in the Oval Office, they come and go every four or eight years.

All of those things are great, but I was like, this isn't what I want to say. And I feel like the people who kind of caused us to be in this predicament in the first place have learned nothing, right? They haven't learned as far as messaging and what works and what doesn't, what people really want to see from Democrats and from the left. So I posted a video essentially saying like,

Not all of us were meant to be Michelle Obama, Jack Schlossberg liberals. Some of us were meant to be Regina George liberals, Lucille Bluth, Principal Ava Coleman. Some of us have some bite to us that we've really been suppressing because y'all told us that we had to. Everyone's getting on here now being like, oh, liberals need to be meaner, Democrats need to be meaner. Stay last, babe. Do you know how many reform mean girls have been waiting for this exact moment in time?

And where did you go from there? Well, from there, I finally was like, okay, I have a plan for this and I have a roadmap for what this looks like and how people can start fighting back and what that really looks like. So I just started making more videos. Rather than using a brush, we're actually just gonna apply directly to the skin and use our hands.

That way it's streaky, it doesn't blend well. I also applied extra tanner to my hands so that it doesn't actually match anything. Some of those videos were, you know, making fun of Republican makeup. Notice that it's also really matte. I wanted a really matte finish. It's getting drained.

It's getting dusty. Some of those videos were making fun of politicians in particular. Everyone's asking me to do Caroline Leavitt's makeup from yesterday, but the problem is, I just don't have the right products because when I'm gleefully taking away school lunches from kids and defunding childhood cancer research, I try not to

look so jaundiced, me personally. Some of it was just talking about our frustrations, but I think in a way that if I had done it prior to the election, it just like, it would not have worked. People would have hated me for it. So you just said Republican makeup. For people who are maybe unaware, what exactly is Republican makeup? It's characterized by lack of, I just say matte and flat. Dry, bland. We wanna make sure that it doesn't look like

we've ever used moisturizer once in our life. Big block eyebrows. For brows, we want bold glamour filter, but in real life and not totally matching. They love some eyeliner over there. Just like a general lack of moisture, including the lipstick. It's crazy.

And how did people respond when you decided to mock Republican makeup? I mean, predictably, right? Republicans had a little hissy fit over it, right? Talking about how, oh, I thought y'all were the party of love and kindness. And I was like, no, look at my pinned video. I literally said.

You don't fight fire with a little drippy water hose. You fight fire with equal exertion of force. Some of them, like, to their credit, were like, okay, this is actually funny. And I do have Republicans who follow me. And I think from the left, there was an overwhelming sense of like, oh my God, we're finally talking a little shit

because I've been ready for this. I just went down the Suzanne Lambert rabbit hole and I'm obsessed. Why am I just finding her? Like, she is my hero. She got an automatic follow from me because bitch, we absolutely need a Regina George of the Democrats. What I will say, what I find funny and interesting

is it's white conservative women and white liberal women who get mad at me. That's that's it almost without exception Right. I'm not gonna speak for everyone interesting. They have the exact same talk track Which is we shouldn't be bullying other women and we shouldn't be bringing them down. I think that's really interesting That they that they share that that commonality in that way of thinking But yeah, they'll be like this is mean and I'm like, I don't care. I heard a rumor that you used to be a Republican, that you were the president of the young Republicans in college maybe.

No, high school. In high school. Yeah. So I grew up in a town called Kennesaw, Georgia. It's like the law to own a gun, for example. That's our slogan. It's the law in Kennesaw. The history teacher was the football coach who also sponsored the Christian club that

met at the school. Everything was taught from this white evangelical lens. I was the president of Young Republicans, which didn't really mean anything. We would just have meetings and be like, isn't Sean Hannity cool? And it's like, why does a 17 year old know who Sean Hannity is? And how did you go from being a, you know, high school Republican and a college Republican to being a liberal woman? What happened?

Was it the makeup? No, but like, honestly, and it was a gradual unraveling, right? But it was when Trump announced his run for presidency. And it was when his tapes came out where he was talking about, you know, assaulting women. And no one was like that bothered by it. And I was like, hold on, hold on, hold on. I feel like people should still be saying, we're still going to vote for him, but that's bad. Like, that's like bottom of the barrel like bar of what I was looking for. And then I got pregnant unexpectedly, didn't want to be pregnant, right? That obviously accelerates a lot of things as well, because like I was super vocally anti-choice, you

know, because that's what I've been taught. I'd never really heard stories of women exercising their right to choose. I thought of them as being lazy and irresponsible, all the things that you're taught. And then you get pregnant all of a sudden and it's like, oh yeah, no, I don't want a kid. Right? Like there was not even a second where I questioned it and I've never questioned it. So then it was like, okay, so if I was wrong about that and they were wrong about

that, what else were they wrong about? And then it just, it all unravels really quickly as soon as you dig, just like a little under the surface. really quickly as soon as you dig just a little under the surface. And I think that's also why, given how vocal I was in the past about my views, it's why I'm so vocal now. One, because I'm kind of like, I grew up Catholic, right? I'm like, this is my penance. I ran my mouth a lot back then. I need to run it twice as much now. But also, I think I want people to be able to see,, oh no, like I actually did used to think what you think.

So like I get why you think that way. Here's why that's wrong though. You said you came, you started doing the mean thing after the election. Of course it was a few months before the second Trump administration entered office, but since they've entered office, there have been a lot of mean things happening. You could argue, you know, Elon Musk saying he needs to take a chainsaw to USAID, an agency that literally keeps the poorest people on earth alive, is mean.

Deporting people who are here legally for things they may have written exercising their First Amendment free speech rights, you could argue is quite mean. Taking photo ops in front of prisoners in El Salvadoran prison who apparently- With your $50,000 Rolex and your mismatched extensions. Didn't even commit a crime other than entering this country without papers, arguably quite mean. Have you seen people come around to the meanness thing in the intervening months since the Trump administration took office?

Yeah, and I have said exactly what you just said, like, hey, if we want to have a mean competition of who's meaner, it's such an absurd conversation to even have given everything that they're doing and the way that you could have listed hundreds of more things. I would say on the left, people have come around. I would say they are uncomfortable, which I think is okay. But for the ones who haven't come around, those aren't the people I'm trying to reach.

I'm not trying to reach the people who are trying to draw a line at critiquing makeup. Not wait, not making racist comments. I've never done anything of that sort. We are talking about mutable choices that you can change. I have Republicans who follow me who will also ask me questions and advice. They'll be like, I'm Republican, but this tutorial was actually the most helpful tutorial I've watched in terms of what not to do. And I'm like, I'll have you around, which surprises me.

But I think it's also what we haven't done before, which is talk about politics alongside topics that are maybe a bit more accessible and entertaining and like interesting. Yeah Well, I was entertained and I definitely look very interesting now. So thank you so much Suzanne for Taking me and our audience on this journey. I think you should go take a lap around the office and show off your work. It's been reported that one in four people experience sensory sensitivities, making everyday experiences like a trip to the dentist especially difficult. In fact, 26% of sensory-sensitive individuals avoid dental visits entirely. In Sensory Overload, a new documentary produced

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process this political moment of ours and her feelings about it. Ine O has been writing about MAGA glam for Mother Jones because it's her job. So you know, it has been disparagingly called Mar-a-Lago face. I would describe it as something of a phenomenon, a trend in the physical appearance of those who support Donald Trump. And whether that's you being in a prominent position of power or simply like an everyday MAGA supporter trying to express affinity or membership with his politics. But the aesthetic, if you want, specifically, overly taut faces, I would say, is like a big thing. Puffed-up lips, lots of apparent use of Botox fillers.

And yeah, and then that makeup that you were talking about. And for me, when I think about it, the effect is this, like, cyborgian, like, smoothness. Sort of gone wrong, though. And, you know, for legal reasons, yeah, I cannot say for a fact that any of these people that I mentioned or that come to mind have gotten these procedures, but it feels apparent. And it feels not just because of the way they look now, but if you compare their faces to maybe five, 10 years ago, they look drastically different.

Oh, who's a good example of that? Who can we look up a before and after on? Well, Kristi Noem is a huge one, and she has admitted to dental work. Well, hi, I'm Kristi Noem. I'm the governor of South Dakota and had the opportunity to come to Smile Texas to fix my teeth, which has been absolutely amazing for years. Lara Trump is another one that people mention. Good evening. Hope you're having a great Saturday night. And welcome to My View.

I'm Laura Trump and I'm excited to welcome you to our inaugural episode. Kimberly Guilfoyle, I believe that's how you pronounce it. Ladies and gentlemen, lovers of liberty and freedom and the American dream. This is our last chance to make America great again. And then also Matt Gaetz at the RNC specifically, you know, his, I mean, apparent use, I'll say again, of Botox was just like, what am I watching? I've done Botox, but not then.

That was a true makeup fail. I don't think there is any kind of official mandate that if you want to be in Donald Trump's either cabinet or just, you know, his inner circle that you have to achieve this look. But I think that as someone who very blatantly values the appearance of someone and the aesthetics of someone is literally obsessed with a pageantry of beauty. I'll go backstage before a show. Yes. And everyone's getting dressed and ready and everything else and you know, no men are anywhere. And I'm allowed to go in because I'm the owner of the pageant and therefore I'm inspecting it. I think that you know that you are performing a key part of his political persona by adopting this very camera-ready aesthetic. And as we know, Donald Trump comes from a reality TV background. But I think it goes a little more than that. This is someone who, I don't know if you saw the way he's

transformed the Oval Office with extreme gold trimming. Gold, all gold, look. Yeah. And like not an inch of the wall is like not covered in these huge over the top portraits. Throughout the years, people have tried to come up with a gold paint that would look like gold, and they've never been able to do it. Can't do it. You've never been able to, look at that look. You've never been able to match gold with gold paint. That's why it's gold. That extends, you know, to the faces and the appearances of the people around him.

But I think now that they are the ruling class who has been voted back into power twice, I think that the looks feel inescapable. I think that while there was some sort of discretion or subtlety or anything back in the first administration, and I mean this both in policy and aesthetics, I think that now it is just like, it is just fully out there. It is Trump 2.0 is extreme in every way you can imagine. I think that also goes to like these Kristi Noem videos. Here at CCOT today and visiting this facility, and first of all, I want to thank El Salvador and their president for their partnership with the United States of America to bring our terrorists here.

You know, she's posing in front of these migrants who have been locked up, but she's in heels and, like, perfect makeup, perfect hair. I also want everybody to know if you come to our country illegally, this is one of the consequences you could face. She's cosplaying ice agent and she of course is doing it with like 25 pounds of hair only to be outdone by her 30 pounds of makeup and false eyelashes. There's no false eyelashes on an ice raid. There are a lot of things going on there,

but one of those things is like their appearance at these jails is gonna create their own news cycles. You know, they know how this works. Mass deportations, but make it hot, make it sexy. This is what a real woman looks like, even if she's performing a job that is maybe seen as traditionally male. You know, it's like a law and order, but,

hey, I can also look like a supposed quote-unquote 10. This is what the ideal woman looks like. It serves many goals for Donald Trump, and she literally recalls Donald Trump telling her, like, I want your face in the ads, these crackdown ads that were going on television, like, I want your face in them. And I want you to, like, thank me for shutting down the border. I don't think that he cares whether or not she might have the experience or the credentials. It's does she have the face to carry out an extremely cruel policy, but like make it look good, you know, and

they absolutely delight in that and they want you to be triggered. They want to shock. And ultimately, what do these aesthetics that so many people in this world are chasing, like symbolize? Is it just an affinity to like Donald Trump's aesthetics or is it something greater? I think it's that. I think it has a lot to do with traditional gender norms, perceived hotness as a power play,

but also reaffirming the affinity of women, even if they're in power. You don't have to be threatened by this woman of power because she is also what a real woman looks like. It harkens back to like a desire to return to a quote unquote golden age of American dominance. I think that you see that a lot in Donald Trump's rhetoric and what his policies are supposedly trying to do.

But that's not just an aesthetics. That's also, you know, we want to return America to a pre-Roe era. So it's twisted in all forms. Unlike Suzanne Lambert, who we talked to earlier in the show, you're not a comedian. When you were writing this piece for Mother Jones, were you at all worried, you know, about toeing the line between critiquing

a certain aesthetic that the most powerful people in the world right now have and being mean to people about how they're presenting themselves. Oh, absolutely. I'm not someone who wants to just point out, um, a specific look or something in a woman's face that I might not agree with just for the sake of pointing that out.

But what's going on with this MAGA aesthetic is political. The image is political. The image that they're crafting is political. And I think that to ignore it would be a mistake, especially when we have a president in power who is all about the appearance as opposed to the actual substance. You dovetail that with just how much more certain procedures are more accessible than they were decades past. You know, it just feels all turbocharged and a lot of things in our politics right now feel very turbocharged. And I think to ignore what might be happening to women's literal faces around Donald Trump would be a mistake. I wrote in this piece about my own relationship to just our beauty industry and how, you know, I'm 37 years old.

I'm a young mother. I have a three-year-old. I am constantly tired. I have not gotten Botox or fillers yet, but they are certainly on my mind. I'm actually going to Korea next month. Yes, it is the plastic surgery capital of the world. Being in Seoul, as a person who has not gotten the same popular procedures as many people in South Korea do. And to know what it feels like to be sort of the odd man out when it comes to a beauty

standard and then feeling just kind of bad about it. You know, I think it helps me in some way empathize also with these maggot figures, not in policy, but in terms of, you know, if you're at Mar-a-Lago, if you're just staying there for a week and everyone around you looks a certain way and you notice like, oh, I'm different, I don't, I can see why you would feel attracted to that look and think, oh, maybe I should do such and such, too. And I think when you're constantly served a specific look and a specific beauty ideal, I see the pull. So maybe we don't need to be super judgmental either, but we can be judgmental about people

who are posing in front of prisoners for kicks. Because right there, the look is political and that is absolutely rife and it deserves our interrogation at the very least. Ine O Senior Editor, motherjones.com. The required reading is titled In Your Face, The Brutal Aesthetics of MAGA. You heard from Suzanne Lambert earlier in the show. You can find her on TikTok, on the gram. Her handle is itssuzannlambert. What else can I tell ya? Gabrielle Burbae made the show today, Amina Alsati edited, Laura Bullard was on Facts,

Patrick Boyd and Andrea Christensdottir were on Sound, Avishai Artsy, Hadi Mawagdi, Amanda Llewellyn, Miles O'Brien, Victoria Chamberlain, Devin Schwartz, Carla Javier and Peter Balanon. Rosen also make the show with executive level supervision from Jolie Meyers and Miranda Kennedy. We use music by Breakmaster Cylinder. My name's Sean Ramesvram. You can send me any and all complaints about the show anytime. The door is open. My email is noel at kingmail.net. Today Explained is distributed by WNYC. The show is a part of Vox. If you'd like to complain about the ads

on this show specifically, you can listen to us ad free by signing up at vox.com slash members. Thanks. you