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I never understood that one, because the only coverage I ever saw of it was "Republicans pounce on tan suit". Despite having what I think is a fairly centrist media diet, I never saw any of the actual condemnation of the suit, but I saw tons of reactions to it. Even looking at the Wikipedia page, I can only find two clear examples of actual comments on the suit by the Republican-aligned (Lou Dobbs on Fox Business, representative Peter King) and a couple of neutral "weird choice" but not particularly condemnatory fashion commentators, amid dozens of links deriding the "controversy".
It always felt very manufactured to me. Honestly, the tan suit never bothered me, but it did feel like everyone focusing on it was distracting from what should have been real controversies of the time (mismanaging the Arab Spring and ISIS, ATF gunrunning, constructing a domestic panopticon). Although in that vein, it does feel like Trump frequently intentionally causes outrage at minor things to distract from major ones.
I get the impression this was something that played out more on Twitter than in meatspace. I’d have thought people had built an immunity by 2014, but apparently not.
It is interesting that even the “republicans pounce” commentary is subdued by post-2016 standards. Outlets are using this to mock Republicans for having nothing better to do; I could barely find anyone calling it racist.
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