From Trump watches to Trump sneakers to Trump Bibles, Donald Trump has been hawking all kind of merchandise recently, partly because both he and his campaign are short on cash and partly because grifting is what he’s all about. So on one level, it’s not surprising that the Trump campaign is selling a T-shirt to commemorate the former president working at a McDonald’s in Feasterville, Pennsylvania, on Sunday. But on another level, it’s ridiculous, as Trump didn’t “work” at all; the restaurant was closed, he served a handful of pre-selected motorists items chosen by he chose, and his shift lasted about 20 minutes.
Nevertheless, on Monday afternoon the Trump campaign sent out an email (sender name: “President Trump - Fry Cook”) informing recipients that there’s a “McGift” waiting for them: a MAGADonald’s T-shirt. The “claim your shirt” button goes to fundraising page offering “every TRUE TRUMP PATRIOT” an opportunity to “order the official MAGADonald’s shirt before they’re sold out.” The suggested donations range from $45 to $1,000.
By Tuesday, the shirts were also available for a mere $35 (plus $7 shipping) from the official Trump campaign store.
While this may seem like an invitation to get sued, it appears that the mock-up of the shirt does not say “McDonald’s” or feature the “golden arches” logo. Plus McDonald’s has made it clear that it would like to stay out of the presidential race, though a statement from McDonald’s Corp. said it agreed to let the franchise owner and operator participate in the campaign event. Per the Associated Press:
In a message to employees obtained Monday by The Associated Press, McDonald’s said the owner-operator of the location, Derek Giacomantonio, reached out after he learned of Trump’s desire to visit a Pennsylvania restaurant. McDonald’s agreed to the event.
“Upon learning of the former president’s request, we approached it through the lens of one of our core values: we open our doors to everyone,” the company said. “McDonald’s does not endorse candidates for elected office and that remains true in this race for the next president. We are not red or blue – we are golden.”
Trump clearly loved playing fast-food worker and has not stopped talking about it online. On Truth Social, he’s posted or reposted messages about his stint at McDonald’s 15 times since Sunday.
Though Trump claimed in another post that he “checked with McDonald’s, and they say, definitively, that there is no record of Lyin’ Kamala Harris ever having worked there,” he has not provided any evidence to back this up. What McDonald’s actually said is that they don’t have 40-year-old records for specific franchises. Per the AP:
The company said it is proud of “Harris’s fond memories working under the arches” and noted the often-cited figure that 1 in 8 Americans works at McDonald’s at some point.
“While we and our franchisees don’t have records for all positions dating back to the early ‘80s, what makes ‘1 in 8’ so powerful is the shared experience so many Americans have had,” McDonald’s said.
The Washington Post was unable to verify Kamala Harris’s claim that she worked at a McDonald’s in Alameda, California, in the summer of 1983, but that doesn’t prove anything. As the paper put it, “The year 1983 exists on the other side of a digital curtain, in the Analog Dark Ages.” There’s no centralized database of everyone who’s ever worked at a McDonald’s franchise, let alone just for a few months.
It’s easy to see why Trump can’t stop talking about McDonald’s. It’s a great opportunity to insist Harris is a liar, since there’s probably no way to prove she worked there. Plus Trump is famously a huge McDonald’s fan. He likes the food (allegedly because he “had a longtime fear of being poisoned”) and he even appeared in a 2002 McDonald’s commercial:
Trump probably couldn’t handle working an actual shift at the fryer, but it seems like McDonald’s spokesman, not president, may be his true calling.