Make America Great Again / #MAGA

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About

Make America Great Again is a slogan adopted by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump for his 2016 United States presidential campaign. The phrase first gained online fame in July 2015 after Trump was photographed wearing a hat bearing the slogan during a visit to the Mexican border, and since then, it has been used by both Trump supporters and critics in various discussions about the candidate.

Origin

Donald Trump adopted "Make America Great Again"^[1] as his official campaign slogan and simultaneously launched merchandise bearing the phrase in June 2015, shortly after announcing his bid for the Republican Party's nomination in the 2016 United States presidential election. However, the slogan went largely unnoticed until Trump donned a hat during a visit to Laredo, Texas near the Mexican border in July 2015.

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Precursor

"Let's Make America Great Again" was first used as a campaign slogan by Ronald Reagan during his 1980 election campaign. Since then, it has often been used as a GOP refrain, most recently as part of the title of the 2011 book on Tea Party politics by Christine O'Donnell.^[2] Trump has claimed to have authored the phrase, but has not produced any proof.^[3]

Spread

Soon after photographs of Trump wearing the hat appeared in the mainstream media, users both began photoshopping new text onto the front of the hat, as well as ordering the hat in droves and using it in photographs, either ironically or not. The Washington Post reported on July 28th that the official hat had sold out from the retail location authorized to sell it; many bootleg versions became available online. ^[4]^[5]

Users on Instagram and Twitter began photographing themselves in the hat, often tagging the photo with the hashtag #MakeAmericaGreatAgain, which had over 7,600 posts as of August 10th, 2015 on Instagram.^[6]^[7] In addition, Funny or Die published a collection on July 24th, 2015, of other slogans photoshopped onto the hat, which inspired similar photoshops to become popular on Tumblr.^[8]^[9] On Reddit, user iamclaytonbigsby posted an image of Trump wearing the hat to /r/photoshopbattles, where it received 28 points.^[10]

The trend of people wearing the hat as a photo fad was covered in The Hollywood Reporter, and the Sun Times, while the photoshop editing was written about in E! Online and Bloomberg News.^[11]^[12]^[13]^[14] The hat itself has spawned two separate parody Twitter accounts, @trumphat, and @Donaldtrumphat, neither of which have more than a couple hundred followers as of August 10th, 2015.^[15]

Various Examples

People Wearing the Hat

Hat Photoshops

Make X Great Again

Make America Gay Again

In June 2016, American Apparel, in collaboration with the Human Rights Campaign and the Ally Coalition, added a series of hats, shirts, and accessories with the words "Make America Gay Again" printed on them to their Gay Pride collection. The company donated 30% of sales from collection toward fighting discrimination against the LGBTQ community.^[19]

On December 29th, 2017, The Aspen Times^[20] reported that neighbors of the home where United States Vice President Mike Pence and his family were vacationing in Aspen, Colorado had hung a rainbow banner reading "Make America Gay Again" at the end of their driveway. The Pitkin County Sheriff's Deputy said that the banner was hung at the end of the driveway where the two properties meet.

The banner was hung in response to the controversial anti-LGBTQ policies of Pence. A resident of the home emailed the Aspen Times and provided a statement. She said, "(The banners) were actually hung by the daughters of the couple who live in the home, and one of their girlfriends (I'm one of them!) with the full support of their parents."

Several news outlets covered the banner, including BuzzFeed, ^[22] The Washington Post,^[23] Mashable^[24] and more.

That day, the Aspen Times tweeted^[21] a picture of the sign (shown below) with the caption, "#Aspen neighbors to VP @mike_pence -- Make America Gay Again. Couple hangs banner outside shared driveway." The post received more than 6,500 retweets and 16,000 likes in less than five days.

Russian Make America Great Again Hat

On January 6th, 2017, actor Alec Baldwin^[18] posted a picture to Instagram of himself wearing a red Make America Great Again hat with the text translated to Russian to troll then-President elect Trump and his alleged ties to the Russian government. The post received more than 29,800 likes.

Make Somalia Great Again

In February 2017, the US Ambassador to Somalia Stephen Schwartz, presented a white and blue cap with the words "MAKE SOMALIA GREAT AGAIN" printed on the front (shown below). The picture and subsequent tweet from the U.S. Mission-Somalia^[17] sparked a backlash because President Trump named Somalia as one of the seven countries in his initial Muslim Ban executive order.

Make the Bucks Great Again

On April 18th, 2017, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker^[16] tweeted a photograph of a green Make America Great Again with the words "MAKE THE BUCKS GREAT AGAIN!" embroidered on the front. Under the picture, he posted the caption "Since the @Bucks are in the #NBAPlayoffs tonight, we made a special hat to give to the @POTUS. #MAGA." The tweet received more than 470 retweets and 1,200 likes.