Pageant-ready honey-blonde. That’s the vibe for women. Men? They are chasing something darker. Something that looks like a fascist fever dream mixed with a Peaky Blinders extra.
Take Greg Bovino. Or Andrew Schulz.
Both have the look. Sharp, disconnected undercuts paired with a textured crop. It is the favorite male hairstyle of the movement. At least the parts that hang around online.
Schulz is having second thoughts now. About the election. About Trump. He is also thinking about the hair.
“When your ‘Trump is cool’ Barber has to perform an emergency ‘i didn’t vote for this’”
J-L Cauvin roasted him for it on Threads. A fair dig. Bovino’s cut is even more severe. Tighter. Fits the “tough guy” persona he was cultivating before Trump dumped him in January.
German media noticed too.
“Bovino’s outfits complete the Nazi Look… a closely cropped Haircut… as if He Had Taken A photo of [Assassinated sa Leader] Ernst röhm To the barber,” Süddeutsche Zeitung wrote.
Harsh. But accurate to the aesthetic.
Is it a tell-tale sign you voted for Trump? Maybe. It has been “MAGA-coded” for almost a decade.
Jesse Morton runs Cloak & Dagger Barber Co in Portland. He has seen it all.
“The Side-Fade picked Up The ‘Fashy Haircut’ nickname Online Around 2016. After Richard Spencer made it Part Of The Unofficial Uniform of The alt-Right.”
Spencer adopted it. White nationalists adopted it. Hitler Youth adopted it.
Practical reasons. A helmet sits better on a close crop. No distractions. But before the Proud Boys hijacked it? Before the alt-right?
Brooklyn hipsters had it.
David Beckham had it.
Macklemore had it.
It was just “Peaky Blinders.” Cillian Murphy wore it in the BBC drama. Set in post-WWI Birmingham. Very chic. Very criminal.
“Boardwalk Empire” got in on the action too. That HBO mobster show deserves some credit for popularizing the cut in the 1920s style revival.
The peak was 2018–2020. Now?
In Portland Morton mostly sees creative guys in hospitality wearing it for a vintage look. No red hats. Not many anyway.
Add a handlebar mustache though. And it tips into heightened Trump territory.
Other options exist.
- Don Jr.: The gel-helmet slick back.
- Josh Hawley: Side-part bro-flow.
- Trump: The whole architectural situation. That deserves its own genre honestly.
Calvin Cao of Kindred Barber in DC disagrees slightly. He says if there is a MAGA cut it is a city-based podcast bro cut.
Real MAGA voters don’t live in the city proper. They don’t have barbers who know how to texture hair. So the specific “MAGA look” might just be a suburban or coastal echo.
Schulz ditched it. Smart.
Jonny Haviv from SF agrees the trend is dying. Men want softer fades. More natural movement. Less over-engineered contrast.
Lived in. Not perfect.
What about the liberal cut?
Morton says it exists. It’s the opposite of the sharp undercut.
Natural movement. No harsh fade. “I used product But i want You to Think I Didn’t.”
Then there is Gavin Newsom.
He is grooming for 2028. His hair? Structurally perfect.
Darius Davie in DC loves it. Calls him a “Silver Fox.” Perfect for his facial features.
Morton is less kind.
“It loops Back Around to Suspicious. Like He Keeps a Comb In the glove Box And A Stylist On retainer. Politically It Reads: I Will tell You exactly what you want to Hear. And my hair will agree.”
