Democrats have decided to publicly label Donald Trump 'weird' and it's about time

At long last, Democrats have leaned into the word “weird.”

Vice President Kamala Harris , now the Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee, has started using it to describe convicted felon and former President Donald Trump. It seems Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz , who’s on Harris’ vice presidential candidate list, led the charge, succinctly saying of Trump and his running mate this weekend: “These guys are just weird.”

There are millions upon millions of American voters ‒ certainly liberals and independents, and I’d bet a decent slice of conservatives ‒ who have spent the past eight or so years watching Trump and the MAGA circus and thinking: “Wow, this is all very weird.”

And it is.

Donald Trump is very, very weird, and we've known this for some time

The rise of Trumpism and the bizarre chaos it ushered in ‒ from family members lost down conspiratorial rabbit holes to the denial of facts and abandonment of shared reality ‒ has given us election lies and Trump-branded Bibles and Rudy Giuliani giving an insane news conference outside a landscaping business in Philadelphia and a dude called the QAnon Shaman wearing a horned fur cap as he joined an attack of the U.S. Capitol.

“Weird” may be the nicest possible description.

It’s certainly the most apt label for Trump and his unhinged rants, his nonsensical stories about sharks or Hannibal Lecter , his blabbering cruelty and unfiltered spouting of whatever odd thought passes through his hate-addled mind.

Kamala Harris should keep leaning into Trump's weirdness

It’s all weird. He’s surrounded by lackeys who are weird and go on Fox News and say weird things about Trump being the greatest president of all time. He is supported by slavish Republicans who once openly denounced him , and their hypocrisy is weird.

His running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, has a slew of past interviews in which he derided “childless cat ladies” and suggested the votes of people who have children should count more than the votes of those who don’t. And that’s all really weird. Plus, he has a tech-bro vibe that’s weird and impersonal ‒ but mainly weird.

Waiting on Trump: When is Trump's 'big boy press conference'? His campaign deflected when I asked.

Tim Walz, with Minnesota-nice, hit the nail on the head by calling Trump weird

Last week, Gov. Walz said on MSNBC , “These guys are just weird. They’re running for He-Man Women Haters Club or something. That’s what they’re doing. That’s just not what people are interested in.”

Yes. YES! Finally!

We've watched so much weirdness from Trump world over the years

We’ve spent years watching all-praise-be-to-Trump types getting three different kinds of worked up over drag queens and books about gay penguins and transgender school kids who just want to be allowed to exist.

The moment President Joe Biden stepped aside and endorsed Harris for the top of the ticket, MAGA Republicans started labeling her a “DEI candidate,” a blatantly racist description of an accomplished politician and sitting vice president.

The GOP presidential nominee is a twice-impeached, one-term president who was convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in a case involving hush money paid to an adult film star. He has had multiple bankruptcies , faces hundreds of millions of dollars in fines from a civil fraud ruling and was found liable of sexual abuse . And he is revered by the Republican Party's evangelical base.

Do you want to know what’s weird to a majority of Americans who are just trying to live their lives? EVERYTHING IN THOSE PREVIOUS THREE PARAGRAPHS!

Joe Biden didn't bust out the 'weird' word, but he should have

For some reason, Biden’s campaign didn’t directly hit Trump with the W-word. But as soon as he stepped aside, Walz, the Harris campaign and other Democratic leaders wasted no time calling the former president what he is: weird.

Harris VP pick? Republicans, pay attention to who Harris picks for VP. One of them should scare us.

Trump never laughs. He’s rarely seen in public with his wife, Melania. He regularly says stuff like this from a recent rally : “We won in 2016. We did much better in 2020, but it was rigged. It was rigged.”

A lot of people throughout the Trump era have looked at his rallies or listened to him or one of his minions on TV and probably quietly said: “How in the heck is anyone taking these weirdos seriously?”

The word 'weird' fits. It works. It's concise and comfortingly spot on.

This is a smart labeling move by Harris and the Democrats. “Weird” captures an almost-exhausted emotion many of us have felt but failed to identify.

And it’s directed where it should be, at Trump's MAGA disciples and the elected Republicans who fall in line. It’s not a broad labeling of his supporters along the lines of Hillary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables.” This isn’t punching down.

It’s cutting to the chase. It’s pointing at the bizarre characters and charlatans who willfully turned our politics toxic and sold ‒ and continue to sell ‒ snake oil and scapegoats to millions of Americans.

What Harris and Co. are rightfully saying to Trump and the Republican leaders in his sway is simple: “Enough. You all are really freakin’ weird.”

Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on X, formerly Twitter, @RexHuppke and Facebook facebook.com/RexIsAJerk

You can read diverse opinions from our USA TODAY columnists and other writers on the Opinion front page , on X, formerly Twitter, @usatodayopinion and in our Opinion newsletter .

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Democrats have decided to publicly label Donald Trump 'weird' and it's about time