Trump's proposed 2020 slogan is familiar because it's the exact tagline from 'The Purge: Election'

Trump doesn't appear to have seen the film, and probably shouldn't.
 By 
Proma Khosla
 on 
Original image replaced with Mashable logo
Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

It makes sense that the man who ran for President with the slogan "Make America Great Again" would pursue reelection with "Keep America Great." Unfortunately for Donald Trump, that slogan was already used in 2016 by the great folks behind The Purge: Election Year.

"Get me my lawyer!" Trump called during an interview with The Washington Post, and it wasn't to start suing the team behind Election Year for the slogan that they came up with first, but to trademark and register "Keep America Great" (exclamation point optional) for 2020.

The Purge film trilogy takes place in an alternate reality where all crimes are legal for one day a year. The annual Purge keeps crime rates down for the rest of the year, but promises one night of inevitable terror. In Election Year, a smart blonde senator insists that the Purge must end for the good of the country.

Before its release, writer James DeMonaco told Entertainment Weekly that parallels between the film and the 2016 election were not accidental. At the time the "Keep America Great" tagline was a direct response to Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan. Time is a flat circle.

"Oddly enough, the guy who plays the President in the movie, he plays him like Trump -- totally by accident," actor Frank Grillo told Comicbook.com in 2016. "There's a lot of parallels between the GOP race and the movie."

Topics Donald Trump

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Proma Khosla

Proma Khosla is a Senior Entertainment Reporter writing about all things TV, from ranking Bridgerton crushes to composer interviews and leading Mashable's stateside coverage of Bollywood and South Asian representation. You might also catch her hosting video explainers or on Mashable's TikTok and Reels, or tweeting silly thoughts from @promawhatup.

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