Trump simplifies complex political arguments with punchy slogans, but strategies could work against him as well if critical phrases spark
What is the new phrase “Tachtostrade” that angers President Trump?
“Taco Trade” is a jab where President Donald Trump tends to impose tariffs, threaten, and return later.
- When clever insults stick, it’s “something that brings a dissertation to the meme fight,” according to crisis management expert Meghan Tisinger.
- According to marketing expert John Rosen, creating phrases like “One Big Beautiful Bill” can help you sell complex laws, but critical phrases can also become albatross around the target’s neck.
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s most punchy political phrases are often the most successful, including branding the slogan of the “one big beautiful bill” that sells his legislative priorities, the enemy to sell “radical left madness” and, of course, the “make America great again” magazine campaign.
But squeakable summaries can also be used to attack complex policies, such as threatening reputations that threaten Trump’s dealings. After Trump imposed tariffs on the uninhabited Antarctic Islands, critics adopted the penguin as a protest mascot. Separately, the newspaper columnist created the acronym taco, “Trump Always Drops the Chicken” to summarise his on and off tariffs during trade negotiations.
“Once a clever insult is stuck, trying to fight the facts is like bringing a dissertation to a meme fight,” Meghan Tisinger, managing director of Leidar USA, a management company for crisis communications and reputation, told USA Today. “The real danger is when you define a brand with nine letters before the other person does it in 800 words.”
Charlie Scuba, an honorary teacher at McDonough Business School in Georgetown, compared Trump’s Red Magazine hat to iconic images of former president George W. Bush seen in tanks and Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis.
“It’s about crystallizing something vague or helping people remember and relate an idea,” Scuba said in an interview. Trump “thinks him like a social media marketer. He thinks him with small memes and short phrases that work to reduce attention.”
The enemy of the Trump brand through the nickname
Trump doesn’t know the catchphrase. He routinely adopted the nicknames for political rivals such as Marco Rubio, the main Republican rival in 2016, or “Little Marco” for California Gov. Gavin “News Come,” according to marketing experts. When the House discussed a 1,100-page package of Trump’s priorities to cut tax and federal spending, lawmakers officially adopted his sales phrase, “One Big Beautiful Bill,” as the title.
John Rosen, an adjunct professor of economics and marketing at New Haven University, compared the strategy to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “New Deal,” Harry Truman’s “Fair Trade,” and John F. Kennedy’s “New Frontier.”
“We need shorthand to talk about these types of things,” Rosen told USA Today. “In contrast to 100 or even thousands of new bills that probably resonate with Trump’s base, which everyone in Washington thinks is spending money and wasting time writing a lot of bills, there’s only one bill.”
Trump critics are working on a phrase to solidify their opposition
Democrats have scrambled their victory messages since losing the White House in November and dominated both Trump and his fellow Republicans in the Congress room.
For example, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y. paralyzed Trump’s phrases about House law by calling him “one ugly bill” and a “partisan monster” he claimed to benefit billionaires and hurt the working class.
When Trump announced the global tariffs that he characterized as “Liberation Day” on April 2, he slapped 10% mandatory imports from Australian territory in the Antarctic Australian Heard Islands and MacDonald’s Islands.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s response to April 2 was direct, but not catchy.
“This is not a friend’s act,” he said. “We won’t be racing to the bottom, which leads to higher prices and slower growth.”
But others sought a new perspective. Critics seized the penguins and took away images of protests about the islands.
Advocacy group Penguin International has been caught in the spotlight with light protests under the “Penguin Protest March” under the banner.
Scuba, who previously worked for sampled advertising agency dancer Fitzgerald, created the slogans “Where is Wendy’s beef?” and “Bite from Crime for the crime dog MacGraffe.”
Many policy experts in Washington have great ideas, but there is no audience or character to catch them, Skuba said. He said the “Just Say No” campaign against drug use by former First Lady Nancy Reagan remains unforgettable. But Biden’s “Build Back Better” campaign never sparked, he said.
Slogans provide a bite-sized summary of complex policies
One counterargument that gains traction is the acronym tacos, “Trump always kicked out chickens.” This is a phrase coined by Financial Times columnist Robert Armstrong.
The phrase initially imposed ease of negotiations over trade transactions after Trump imposed strict tariffs on countries including China, Canada, Mexico and the European Union. Trump claims tariffs will raise billions of dollars while still bringing jobs to restore the US.
But tariff critics smacked the president with taco and chicken memes. The Democratic National Committee parked a photo of Trump wearing a chicken suit for lunch on June 3rd in front of the Republican National Committee in Washington, D.C.
Rep. Eric Swalwell of D-Calif., who helped in prosecute Trump’s second round of bullets each in 2021, did not need words to oppose tariffs. He just posted a video of Tiktok eating tacos on June 2nd after someone asked about Trump’s tariffs that caught the attention of Fox News.
“I don’t know what this fox newslady had for lunch, but she’s talking about what I had,” Swalwell told social media.
The widely distributed and fake photos featured George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden eating tacos and wearing shirts saying “going to tacos.” The message resonated with the phrase “Let’s Go Brandon,” which became its own meme after reporters were mischaracterized by blasphemous antagonists who cried out by fans at the NASCAR race in October 2021.
Trump seemed to understand the damage that could make memorable phrases. Asked in the oval office on May 28th, Trump called out the question “nasty.” He argued that imposing high tariffs took foreign leaders to the negotiation table.
“Oh, it’s not that good. I drove the chicken out? I’ve never heard of it,” Trump said. “It’s called negotiation.”
It’s not who’s right, but “fast and clear at first”: Experts
Marketing experts said that the stakes of well-transformed phrases could be high, but it is not always clear what the winning message is.
Obama was pleased to have become known as Obamacare, an Affordable Care Act that expands access to health insurance.
But when inflation flourished in 2024, Bidenomics, a shorthand for Biden’s economic policy, “has become an albatross around the neck,” Rosen said.
“In moments of crisis or conflict, very few move faster than a sharp slogan or get hit harder and harder,” says Tisinger. “It’s not who’s right, but who’s the first, fast, clear.”
