From ‘Aspie supremacy’ to vaccines: The toxic autism politics of Trump’s second administration

From Elon Musk to RFK, the right has developed an obsession with pushing two seemingly contradictory — but equally damaging — theories on autism, writes Eric Garcia. And this obsession is bleeding into everything from Trump cabinet picks to policy

The Trump era has given rise to a singularity of toxic autism tropes (Getty)

Back in September, an X/Twitter account known as Autism Capital posted a screenshot of a written theory that appeared to be taken from 4Chan. The theory postulated that only “high [testostrone] alpha males” and “aneurotypical people” can think freely and be trusted to know what is objectively true. That means “a Republic for high-status males is best for decision making,” the theory continued. Elon Musk, the X owner and Tesla executive, responded: “Interesting observation.”

Little wonder that Musk found such proclamations interesting. He has talked in public a number of times about having “Asperger’s syndrome” (a term that fell out of favor as researchers learned the extent of Hans Asperger’s collaboration with the Nazi regime’s child euthanasia program and one that hasn’t been used clinically since 2013.) The concept of “Aspie supremacy” — a term some disability rights advocates coined for the deeply problematic idea that people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) who previously would be considered as having Asperger’s are superior to both neurotypical people and other autistic people — has been around for a while. But it’s gained traction in the past few years in some very online, very right-wing spaces.

It is a comforting ideology for someone like Musk. Musk has talked in the past about his struggles misunderstanding social cues as a child. “I was bullied quite a lot, so I did not have a sort of happy childhood, to be frank,” he said once. But he’s also talked about the possible benefits of his autism, saying: “I think there's maybe some value, also from a technology standpoint, because I found it rewarding to spend all night programming computers just by myself.”

For someone like Musk, the social isolation is the tax that he paid of being a genius who is able to spend late nights exploring technology. That likely fuels his superiority complex.

Musk’s co-opting of such ideas gives a new lens through which to view his venture with Vivek Ramaswamy to lead the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in Donald Trump’s administration. After all, if Musk believes that only neuroatypical people and high-testosterone people should be making decisions in government, then it follows that men like he and Ramaswamy know — better than Congress, which has the power of spending dictated in the Constitution — which departments deserve cash and which deserve to starve. Two hand-picked men are much better at decision-making in that scenario than a diversity of lawmakers.

One might be surprised, then, to see how easily Musk — who also views his neurotype as a potential contributor to his business acumen — could collaborate so easily with Robert F Kennedy Jr, who has become one of the leading proponents of the debunked myth that vaccines cause autism. To believe that, then you have to at least believe autism means something “wrong” with a person.

But the convergence of these seemingly two contrasting streams make a bizarre amount of sense. And to understand why, you have to go back to when Trump himself first started talking about autism.

One of the most common tics in Donald Trump’s language that many people have now adopted in their own cheap imitations of him is his use of the phrase “many such cases.” But few remember that he was using the term even way back in 2014, when he tweeted: “Healthy young child goes to doctor, gets pumped with massive shot of many vaccines, doesn't feel good and changes - AUTISM. Many such cases!”

Trump and the ‘cure’ for autism

He would repeat this claim during one of the first Republican debates — a claim that triggered television physician Mehmet Oz to tweet at the time: “Just a reminder: there is no evidence that there is any link between vaccines and autism.” Last month, Trump nominated Oz to serve as his director for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. But Oz and Trump are not entirely misaligned on the issue. Despite coming out against the vaccine theory, Oz has promoted misinformation about autism in the past — such as when he suggested that certain types of vitamins decrease the chances of autism.

Trump came to understanding autism largely thanks to the tutelege of Bob Wright, the former head of NBC Universal who would later go on to found Autism Speaks with his wife, Suzanne Wright. He and Wright came to know each other during the 80s, when Wright led GE Capital and Trump hoped to move NBC to his planned Television City. The two remained friends; indeed, Wright would be instrumental in helping Trump stage his 2000s comeback, when he made Trump the host of The Apprentice on NBC.

While Autism Speaks says it does not believe vaccines cause autism, Wright’s daughter Katie, the mother of his autistic grandson, was a board member of Kennedy’s Children Health Defense.

Many autistic people have objected to Autism Speaks’ approach, given its lack of autistic leaders and its historic support for finding an autism “cure” (something the group says it no longer supports.) In his memoir, Wright said that he felt disappointed that President Barack Obama failed to light the White House blue — something the nonprofit had asked for as a gesture of support — during in his first year in office. Trump did, however. And Trump also said during his presidency, in a proclamation on World Autism Day, that “ongoing efforts to scan the human genome carry significant potential to better manage the disorder and, ultimately, find a cure.”

Autism and January 6th

In the wake of January 6, some of the rioters — most famously including the so-called “QAnon shaman” Jacob Chansley — argued that their being on the autism spectrum meant they should not be prosecuted. At trial, a lawyer for one of the defendants who stormed the Capitol and identified as autistic reportedly sought to trigger a sensory meltdown in his client as a means to garner sympathy.

It’s a reprehensible tactic. Furthermore, such use of autism as a defense directly contradicts Musk’s line of thinking. The defendants’ argument postulates that they can be easily manipulated and therefore cannot be held accountable for their own actions due to their neurotype.

Either way, Trump has suggested he will give pardons to January 6 convicts when he returns to office — so the use of autism as an alibi might become a moot point.

Trans rights and autism

Myths and misunderstanding about autism have also seeped into the right’s messaging about transgender people. In 2023, during the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Marjorie Taylor Greene said that people who have gender dysphoria are “victims” who have diagnoses “of autism, mental illness. They have depression, they have anxiety, they have psychosis.”

Musk, when talking about his transgender daughter who has since disowned him, said she was “born gay and slightly autistic, two attributes that contribute to gender dysphoria.”

It is true that more plenty of autistic people identify as transgender. But the implication being made by some on the right is that because plenty of people who experience gender dysphoria and transgender people are also autistic, they must somehow have been manipulated into transitioning their gender.

It is entirely likely that, as Republicans re-assume power in multiple health agencies, that this will be used as a rationale to restrict-gender affirming care. Needless to say, such thinking suggests a shocking lack of agency on behalf of those on the spectrum. It is both infantilizing and insulting. And it’s hard to see how this sits alongside the “Aspie supremacy” style of thinking popularized among others on the right — although it’s entirely possible that they see themselves as the “good” autists, and others as the malleable, naive “bad” ones.

Unfortunately, these co-occurring streams of toxic ideology around autism show no signs of abating. And their popularity as Republican talking-points means the legitimate needs of autistic people across America — such as better research into how to support them during their lifespan; research into co-occurring health conditions; and services to support them living in their homes with their family and loved ones — will be pushed to the wayside in favor of misinformed theorizing.

A lonely place for ‘savants’

Very few autistic people are actually savants. The right’s obsession with the idea of such hyperintelligent neurodiverse people — one that has also become popular to discuss on Silicon Valley stages and tech bro podcasts — is mainly a fantasy. Those autistic people who are savants, or who are uniquely skilled, often find cold comfort in their intellect when they are deeply socially isolated. Their isolation can sometimes give them the impression that they are superior to others, when really they are simply struggling to relate because of a difficulty in reading social cues.

Simply put, promoting the idea that autistic people should be welcomed and embraced by society, and that accommodations for their needs should be made, is a good idea. Promoting the idea that lower-needs autistic people are superior to their neurotypical or more high-needs autistic counterparts is not.

The anti-vaccine myths — and the idea, along with them, that autism can be triggered or cured in otherwise neurotypical people — may have been largely debunked. But they have now entered our political bloodstream. Expect more such malaise during a second Trump term.

Eric Garcia is the author of ‘We’re Not Broken: Changing the Autism Conversation’