President Donald Trump threw a unity party for Republican senators at the newly paved-over White House Rose Garden on Tuesday to celebrate the GOP’s steadfast refusal to negotiate with Democrats as the government shutdown drags into its fourth week with no end in sight.
And ripping a page out of his previous playbooks, he sent the lawmakers home with Trump merchandising swag bags.
Reporter Ryan Nobles posted photos of the gifts Trump gave away like door prizes at his gathering, including one to Missouri Sen. Eric Schmitt, writing, “Senator Schmitt showed us his ‘Gulf of America’ Trump signed hat from his White House swag bag.”
“Tacky AF also isn’t that illegal?” this Threads user wondered.
“What an embarrassing group of people,” another commented in response to a Threads post of a photo of South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham showing off his swag bag “Make America Great Again” cap.
“If I would have accepted a notepad at work I would have been let go. Why does everything just get overlooked?” social media user Mary Jacob posted on Threads.
View on Threads
“Merch queens,” still another remarked.
“What a sycophantic ass,” another pointed out.
“Oh give me a f-cking break! Bunch of children. I want to know how much those goodie bags cost the American taxpayer!” still another demanded.
This isn’t the first time Trump has handed out signed Trump-themed merchandise. He did the same thing after his “One Big Beautiful Bill” passed the Senate last summer.
He went on what The New York Times called a “blunt-force charm offensive,” giving lawmakers signed swag and posing for photos in the Oval Office.
Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett said of Trump on X at the time, “He signed a bunch of stuff—it’s cool.”
“He told me he likes seeing me on TV, which was kind of cool,” Burchett smoozed. He also said Trump showered other Republicans with MAGA memorabilia, too.
But the optics of celebrating Republicans’ refusal to negotiate with Democrats over the ongoing shutdown as federal workers stand in line at food pantries is alarming, to say the least, and another sign of just how out of touch Trump is with the average American and even his own federal workers.
Trump has continued to politicize the stalemate between Democrats and Republicans and has continued to blame Democrats for the closure, despite the fact that Trump and Republicans control the government.
He has ordered his budget chief to cut Democrat-supported programs and projects in an attempt to try to force his opponents into giving in and voting to pass a stopgap funding measure.
But Democrats aren’t caving. They’ve demanded any spending measure include protections for expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies and reverse drastic Medicaid cuts Trump and Republicans made when the President’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” passed this summer without any bipartisan support.
The sweeping bill extends Trump’s 2017 tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and pays for other administration priorities. But it does so by cutting more than $1 trillion from health programs in the largest such federal rollback in history.
