Trump trashed the US military for becoming 'woke' a few hours after claiming he actually hates that term
- Donald Trump spent some of Thursday complaining about calling things "woke."
- His objection — based on the idea that the term is poorly understood — did not last long.
Former President Donald Trump used the term "woke" to mock the US military only hours after saying he thought that line of attack was ineffective because people don't know what it means.
"They're not learning to fight and protect us from some very bad people, they want to go woke, they want to go woke — that's all they talk about now," said Trump at a town hall event hosted Thursday by Fox News.
It directly contradicted what he said earlier that day at a campaign event in Iowa.
He said: "I don't like the term 'woke' because I hear 'woke, woke, woke' — you know, it's like just a term they use, half the people can't even define it, they don't know what it is."
As Insider's Kelsey Vlamis reported, Trump's decision to attack the term appeared to be a jab at his rival Ron DeSantis, who has made countering perceived wokeness a central part of his political identity.
Trump's stated distaste for the word is also contradicted by years of his previous actions, right up to the present.
As recently as Saturday, Trump complained on his Truth Social network that Disney was "Woke and Disgusting," an attack in much the same vein as DeSantis in his high-profile feud with the company.
Railing against wokeness has long been commonplace for Trump. Some things he has called woke:
- People advocating for transgender rights
- Shadowy forces trying to stop people saying "Merry Christmas"
- The US Women's National Soccer Team
- An unspecified "Mob trying to destroy our country"
- GOP Sen. Mike Rounds
- Former GOP Rep. Mo Brooks
- US generals he saw on TV
- Dr. Seuss books
Meanwhile on Thursday, DeSantis' campaign was distracted by his inconsistent pronunciation of his surname.
After news outlets and Trump picked up on his tendency to flit between the variants Deh-Santis and Dee-Santis, a reporter asked him straight up which was right. DeSantis' response was that his surname is pronounced "winner."