Commercial Make America Great Again Black Woman

President-elect Donald Trump poses for a portrait at Trump Tower on Jan. 17. (Matt McClain/The Washington Post)

"Make America Great Again."

The 4 words that would help propel Donald Trump to the White House were an inspiration built-in years before, when hardly anyone only Trump himself could imagine him taking the oath of office equally the 45th president of the The states.

It happened on Nov. 7, 2012, the day after Mitt Romney lost what had been presumed to be a winnable race against President Obama. Republicans were spiraling into an identity crisis, ane that had some wondering whether a GOP president would e'er sit in the Oval Office over again.

But on the 26th floor of a golden Manhattan tower that bears his name, Trump was coming to the conclusion that his ain moment was at paw.

And in typical fashion, the first thing he thought nigh was how to brand information technology.

One after another, phrases popped into his caput. "We Will Make America Swell." That one did not have the right ring. Then, "Brand America Groovy." But that sounded similar a slight to the country.

And and so, it hit him: "Make America Great Once more."

"I said, 'That is so good.' I wrote information technology downwards," Trump recalled in an interview. "I went to my lawyers. I have a lot of lawyers in-house. Nosotros have many lawyers. I have got guys that handle this stuff. I said, 'Come across if you can take this registered and trademarked.' "

(Alice Li/The Washington Post)

5 days later, Trump signed an awarding with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Function, in which he asked for exclusive rights to use "Make America Not bad Again" for "political action group services, namely, promoting public awareness of political issues and fundraising in the field of politics." He enclosed a $325 registration fee.

His was a vision that ran against the conventional wisdom of the time — in fact, it was "much the reverse," Trump said.

To salve itself, the Republican establishment was convinced, the GOP would have to sand off its edges, become kinder and more inclusive. "Brand America Bully Over again" was divisive and astern-looking. It made no nod to diversity or civility or progress.

It sounded like a death wish.

But Trump had seen something unlike in the country, and in the daily lives of its struggling citizens.

"I felt that jobs were hurting," he said. "I looked at the many types of illness our state had, and whether information technology's at the border, whether information technology's security, whether it's law and gild or lack of constabulary and guild. And then, of course, you lot become to trade, and I said to myself, 'What would be practiced?' I was sitting at my desk, where I am right now, and I said, 'Make America Great Again.' "

Democrats slammed it.

"If yous're looking for someone to say what is wrong with America, I'm not your candidate. I retrieve in that location is more right than wrong," Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton said. "I don't think we take to brand America great. I remember we take to make America greater."

Her husband, former president Pecker Clinton, went and then far as to declare it a racist domestic dog whistle.

"I'm really old plenty to remember the good old days, and they weren't all that good in many ways," he said at a rally in Orlando. "That message where 'I'll give yous America bully again' is if you're a white Southerner, you lot know exactly what it ways, don't yous?"

The slogan itself was not entirely original. Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush-league had used "Let's Make America Bully Again" in their 1980 campaign — a fact that Trump maintained he did non know until about a year ago.

"But he didn't trademark it," Trump said of Reagan.

His decision to merits legal ownership reflected a businessman'due south mind-prepare. "I think I'm somebody that understands marketing," Trump said.

Trump Organisation lawyer Alan Garten said Trump holds upward of 800 trademarks in more 80 countries.

The trademark became effective on July 14, 2015, a month later on Trump formally announced his campaign and met the legal requirement that he was actually using it for the purposes spelled out in his awarding.

Having won the trademark, Trump was aggressive in protecting his idea. When his GOP main rivals Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker began tucking "brand America cracking again" into their own speeches, Trump's lawyers fired off cease-and-desist letters.

Trump'due south red trucker cap featuring the Make America Corking Over again slogan was ubiquitious during the campaign. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

More than just a hat

Trump was an impulsive and erratic candidate who ran a chaotic campaign. The one constant, information technology often seemed, was "Make America Smashing Again."

"I didn't know it was going to take hold of on like it did. It'south been amazing," Trump said. "The chapeau, I guess, is the biggest symbol, wouldn't yous say?"

There were plenty of snickers when his Federal Ballot Commission filings showed that his campaign was spending more than on "Make America Great Again" trucker caps than on polling, political consultants, staff or tv ads.

"An appropriate icon for his failing entrada," the Washington Examiner'south Philip Wegmann wrote in late October. "The millions of hats will brand excellent keepsakes for those who idea his populist bravado could overcome Clinton's unimaginative and conventional but well-oiled political machine."

Trump saw the hats as a fundraising and advertising vehicle. He was thrilled when his campaign headgear landed in the New York Times Way department — during Fashion Week, no less.

"In the Style section, it was the ornament — what practice you call that? — an accessory. They said the accessory of the year. Yous know the chapeau. You'd see people going to the fanciest assurance at the Waldorf Astoria wearing cherry hats," he exulted.

As is often the instance, Trump's description is more than a petty hyperbolic. What the newspaper actually wrote was that the "old-school" caps had become "the ironic must-have fashion accompaniment of the summertime," favored by hipsters for their "uncanny ability to capture the current absurdist political moment."

None of which fazed the celebrity billionaire who had debuted the hats by wearing ane during a July 2015 trip to the Mexican border — or the legions of supporters who raced to snap them upwards. Trump had designed them himself, he said. The bones models sold through his entrada website were priced at $25.

"How many did nosotros sell? Does anyone know? Millions!" Trump said in the interview.

"It was copied, unfortunately. Information technology was knocked off by 10 to one. It was knocked off by others. But it was a slogan, and every time somebody buys i, that'southward an advertisement."

However many hats he sold, what cannot exist disputed is that "Brand America Nifty Over again" caught on. It was the most constructive kind of political bulletin, bite-sized and visceral.

"Information technology actually inspired me," Trump said, "because to me, it meant jobs. Information technology meant industry, and meant military strength. It meant taking care of our veterans. It meant so much."

[When was America great? Information technology depends on who you are.]

That kind of mission statement was something that Clinton'southward campaign — for all its poll testing and high-priced advice from Madison Avenue — struggled to articulate.

Her strategists considered 85 possibilities for a full general-ballot campaign slogan before settling on "Stronger Together," according to an email from the account of campaign chairman John Podesta that was published by WikiLeaks.

What they were up confronting was nothing curt of "a marketing genius," said David Axelrod, who had been Obama'south chief political strategist. Trump "understood the market that he was trying to reach. You tin't deny him that. He was very focused from the start on who he was talking to."

While Clinton carried the pop vote, Trump lined up u.s. he needed to win what mattered: the electoral college.

"In terms of galvanizing the market that he was talking to," Axelrod said, "he did it single-mindedly and ingeniously."

Thinking reelection

Halfway through his interview with The Washington Post, Trump shared a bit of news: He already has decided on his slogan for a reelection bid in 2020.

"Are yous ready?" he said. " 'Keep America Great,' exclamation signal."

"Get me my lawyer!" the president-elect shouted.

Two minutes subsequently, one arrived.

"Will you trademark and register, if you would, if you similar it — I think I like information technology, right? Do this: 'Keep America Bully,' with an exclamation point. With and without an exclamation. 'Go along America Smashing,' " Trump said.

"Got it," the lawyer replied.

That bit of business out of the way, Trump returned to the interview.

"I never thought I'd be giving [you] my expression for four years [from now]," he said. "But I am so confident that nosotros are going to be, it is going to be then amazing. Information technology's the only reason I requite it to you lot. If I was, similar, ambiguous nearly it, if I wasn't certain about what is going to happen — the country is going to exist great."

All of which raises the questions: How can greatness be measured and sensed? What does information technology even mean?

"Being a slap-up president has to do with a lot of things, but one of them is being a keen cheerleader for the land," Trump said. "And we're going to evidence the people as we build upwardly our armed services, we're going to display our military.

"That military may come up marching down Pennsylvania Avenue. That war machine may be flight over New York City and Washington, D.C., for parades. I hateful, we're going to be showing our military," he added.

But Trump acknowledged that slogans and showmanship volition not be the ultimate tests of whether the country is "great once again."

The president-elect has an ambitious to-do list for the next iv years: building stronger borders, keeping the country safety against terrorism, producing more jobs, repealing the Affordable Care Deed, replacing information technology with something better, promoting excellence in engineering and scientific discipline, investing in modern infrastructure.

Ultimately, it volition be upwardly to the people for whom "Brand America Peachy Again" was a covenant, not a slogan, to decide whether the 45th president has lived up to his hope.

"I recall they have to feel it," Trump acknowledged. "Beingness a cheerleader or a salesman for the country is very important, but you all the same have to produce the results."

"Honestly, you oasis't seen anything even so. Wait till y'all see what happens, starting next Mon," he said. "A lot of things are going to happen. Corking things."

Read more:

Trump's Cabinet nominees keep contradicting him

Surprisingly, Trump inauguration shapes up to be a relatively easygoing affair

'Finally. Someone who thinks like me.'

Alice Crites contributed to this report.

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Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-donald-trump-came-up-with-make-america-great-again/2017/01/17/fb6acf5e-dbf7-11e6-ad42-f3375f271c9c_story.html

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