Rudy Giuliani's Hair Dye Streaks

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Part of a series on Rudy Giuliani. [View Related Entries]

About

Rudy Giuliani's Hair Dye Streaks refers to the black liquid dripping down the face of United States President Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani during a press conference about unverified claims of voter fraud. Online, people used the event to make jokes about Giuliani melting.

Origin

On November 19th, 2020, Rudy Giuliani and the Trump legal team held a press conference that alleged wide-spread voter fraud in the 2020 U.S. Presidential election. During the press conference, cameras observed black liquid running down the sides of Giuliani's face.^[1]

Spread

Following the press conference, some online began joking about Giuliani melting on camera. For example, Twitter ^[2] user @ShawnPFitzgera1 shared the image of Giuliani sweating with the poster for the film The Incredible Melting Man (shown below, left).

Others commented on the application of hair dye and makeup. The verified Twitter^[3] account for the The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees tweeted, "Here's why you should hire union hair and makeup professionals." The tweet received more than 117,000 likes and 19,000 retweets in 24 hours (shown below, center).

A Four Seasons Total Landscaping parody account tweeted,^[4] ".@RudyGiuliani Rudy, you better damn well tell everyone you didn’t get that creosote here! Four Seasons creosote: dry to the touch in 30 minutes!" The tweet received more than 27,000 likes and 5,500 retweets in less than 24 hours (shown below, right).

The incident inspired two threads on Reddit, which received more than 92,000 points. The thread in /r/PublicFreakout^[5] by @giggitygooooh received more than 92,400 points (84% upvoted) and 6,900 comments in less than 24 hours. The thread in /r/pics^[6] received more than 98,000 points (78% upvoted) and 4,500 comments in less than 24 hours (shown below).

The following day, Redditor killerpixill posted the photo in the /r/photoshopbattles^[7] subreddit. People responded to the post with image edits of the photo. The post received more than 29,000 points (84% upvoted) and 660 comments in less than 24 hours (examples below).

Several media outlets covered the incident, including The Guardian,^[1] Complex,^[8] Elle,^[9] Rolling Stone,^[10] The Daily Beast,^[11] Slate^[12] and more. The New York Times^[13] refuted the theory that the substance was hair dye. Speaking to several hairdressers, the Times reports:

“Hair dye doesn’t drip like that, unless it’s just been applied,” said David Kholdorov of the Men’s Lounge Barbershop and Spa, on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

He explained that hair dye is typically mixed with peroxide during the dyeing process, and that once the solution oxidizes, the color adheres to the hair. No one would leave the solution in place in its raw form, he said, because the solution would irritate the scalp and could burn the hair or cause it to fall out.

Mirko Vergani, the creative color director at the Drawing Room, a salon in downtown Manhattan, said it was far more likely that Mr. Giuliani had used mascara or a touch-up pen to make sure his sideburns matched the rest.

“Sideburns are more gray than the rest of the head,” he said. “You can apply mascara to touch the gray side up a bit so it looks more natural.”