Donald Trump spent the past week discovering that the American public has a new favorite pastime: booing him like he’s the villain in a 1990s teen rom-com. Forget red carpets; this is the Boo Carpet, and Trump is strutting down it in full MAGA regalia while audiences nationwide perfect their heckling technique.
It started in Washington, D.C., where the self-styled “man of the people” attempted to pull off an “undisclosed” dinner with the press at Joe’s Seafood—a location so secretive it’s literally within shouting distance of the White House. The result? A dining-room version of a Metallica concert minus the guitars but with twice the hostility. Patrons booed, jeered, and labeled him “modern-day Hitler,” while Trump tried to channel his inner maître d’, waving awkwardly at the same people who were telling him to go back to Mar-a-Lago.
And because irony is dead but camp is alive, the former reality-TV host-turned-fascist-President has been staging his “man of the masses” photo ops at sporting events. Last week at the U.S. Open men’s final in New York, Trump arrived in a Rolex luxury box like a Bond villain who bought his tux on Canal Street. He stood for the national anthem, flashed his best “see, I’m relatable” smile, and then—cue the sound of a thousand Bronx cheers—got booed so loudly the broadcast director reportedly ordered the sound to be muted. Sadly for Team MAGA, social media exists, and within hours videos of the jeers had more views than a Taylor Swift breakup song.
Then came Yankee Stadium on September 11th, where Trump once again attempted to bask in the glow of patriotic nostalgia. Instead, he got a “mixed response”—which in publicist-speak means “the crowd hated it but at least nobody threw a hot dog.” For a man obsessed with ratings, it’s the ultimate humiliation: he’s underwater in the polls and now underwater in stadium decibel levels. Someone cue the Jaws theme.
Even Trump’s go-to issues aren’t saving him. Polls show him losing ground on the economy, foreign policy, crime, and immigration—the very pillars he built his MAGA temple upon. It’s like watching a bad sequel where the hero forgot his own catchphrases. Reuters/Ipsos has his approval at 42%, Gallup at 40%, and the aggregate looking like the Dow Jones after one of his tariff tweets. In short, he’s “swimming with the fishes,” though judging by his seafood dinner, maybe that was the plan all along.
Meanwhile, GOP lawmakers aligned with Trump are experiencing their own boo-lash at town halls across the country. Californians are chanting “Tax the rich” at Republican reps like it’s the hook of a new Lizzo single. Nebraska’s Mike Flood reportedly heard the chants “loud and clear,” though his talking points suggest selective hearing remains a party-wide affliction.
And the stage-managing? The hush-orders to broadcasters? It’s all giving strong “North Korea chic” vibes. Because when a president has to control camera angles, audio levels, and crowd shots just to avoid public embarrassment, the show has officially jumped the shark. Not even Fox News’ soft-focus lens can hide the fact that the emperor’s red tie has no clothes.
The message from Americans is unmistakable: every boo is a poll, every chant a headline. Trump may still believe he’s starring in “The Apprentice: Oval Office Edition,” but the audience has already voted, and the catchphrase is no longer “You’re fired.” It’s “We’re tired.”
