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It appears the (remaining) Trump supporters and Russian bots in my Facebook and Twitter feeds have a new favorite hashtag: #KAG. “Kill all girls?” one friend earnestly asked. “Something Jabba the Hutt says under duress?” she tried again. Alas, no: KAG is short for Keep America Great, President Trump’s new 2020 campaign slogan, which he confirmed at a Pennsylvania rally over the weekend where he campaigned for struggling Republican congressional candidate Rick Saccone.
“We can’t say ‘Make America Great Again,’ because I already did that,” Trump said.
There are a few things wrong with #KAG—and not just that it doesn’t quite roll off the tongue. For one, a mere year into Trump’s presidency, #MAGA had only just seemed to finally be fading from public discourse. The arrival of a new campaign slogan only underlines one of the president’s own weaknesses—that Trump prefers the high drama and competition of campaigning to actually doing his job and governing. Even more concerning, though, is that #KAG is, at its heart, characteristically delusional: It’s a declaration that, after a single tumultuous year in office, the president has already succeeded in his original goal of making America great, and now, you know, just has to keep it that way.
By that definition, “great” means receiving some of the lowest approval ratings in modern history, a 2016 campaign embroiled in a federal investigation over Russian interference (that is already delivering indictments), a White House in constant chaos, and mass protests breaking out on what feels like a monthly basis against his administration’s treatment of women, science, immigrants, and children being killed in mass shootings at school. Ask anyone in America struggling through the opioid crisis or waiting for their coal jobs to miraculously return per the president’s promise, and they’ll tell you: America is definitely not “great” yet.
KAG isn’t just the new MAGA. It’s the new George W. Bush standing beneath a “Mission Accomplished” banner in 2003, declaring a combat victory in Iraq . . . a war that would rage on for another eight years. #KAG feels less like a campaign slogan and more like a desperate attempt to gaslight voters into believing it’s all unicorns and rainbows under Trump. It may take time, but most Americans are smart enough to figure it out when a president is playing them.
