We're In the 'My Dad Is Bigger Than Your Dad' Stage of the Election

Following Thursday night’s final presidential debate, Donald Trump Jr decided to congratulate his father, President Trump, the only way he knew how: Dragging Hunter Biden into it.

The eldest and most camo-friendly of Trump’s sons posted a selfie of himself and his father on Instagram with the caption, “MY BIG GUY DESTROYED HUNTER’S BIG GUY!!!” Flame emojis flanked the message on both sides, only adding to the playground nature of his boast against Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s son.

The right has been zeroed in on Hunter Biden for well over a year now, desperate to turn an unremarkable case of nepotism into a full-blown scandal. The Trump camp and its allies claim that Hunter’s role on the board of Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma in 2014 was coupled with a litany of Obama era foreign policy implications, as then-Vice President Biden was instrumental in the administration’s Ukraine policy. More recently, allegations are swirling that the father and son conspired in a Chinese oil business venture.

But there is no proof of underhanded or shady dealings on Joe Biden’s part. Hunter coasted off the Biden name to secure a career for himself and was paid handsomely for it while drug addiction and infidelity plagued his personal life. This isn’t particularly noteworthy, especially when nepotism is encouraged in the Trump White House. Given Don Jr’s own leg-up using daddy’s name and his chaotic personal life, he and Hunter have much more in common than his posturing often suggests.

But Trump is behind in the polls, so any attempt to characterize Biden as corrupt—like he successfully did with Hillary in 2016—is in play.

The Trump camp has less than two weeks to make it work. But in the meantime, Donald Trump Jr will sing dad’s praises and dunk on the Biden’s any chance he can get.

In his Instagram post, Don Jr added, “@realdonaldtrump absolutely mopped the floor with Joe Biden tonight!!!” This, of course, is an exaggeration: Trump admittedly was more even-keeled than his first, disastrous debate performance in September. But Trump’s responses were still riddled with lies, and polls have shown that viewers—including undecideds—preferred Biden to Trump.

It’s evident that most voters operate outside of the Brietbart echo chamber, and aren’t too inclined to really give a shit about Joe Biden’s son chain-smoking in a bathtub while covid-19 decimates the economy and their lives. Wow, fancy that.