Slate’s homepage editors spend a lot of time looking for editorial photos to put on our site. Those searches sometimes yield unexpected results: random, perplexing, and mesmerizing photos that don’t belong on the homepage, but that are too good not to share. Every week, we’ll share the weirdest photo from the wires.
What search term was used to find this in Getty?
“donald trump”
What were you hoping to find?
A photo of the former president, who continues to do his Trumpy thing, even though he’s no longer dominating the headlines (or clogging people’s Twitter feeds) as he once was.
What did you find instead?
Donald Trump standing at a lectern, displaying a sign that reads “Never give up!” in a loopy script. He holds it up proudly, like a child showing off an art project, and though the canvas faces outward, it seems he’s using it to exhort himself as much as the crowd.
It’s disconcerting to see this script, dubbed the “bridesmaid font,” outside its natural Etsy/Instagram/Pinterest habitat, where it commonly adorns wedding invites and “Rosé all day” wine glasses. The image is so incongruous that at first I thought the sign might be photoshopped, but it is indeed real. The bubbly, classy-but-casual cursive is a sharp counterpoint to Trump’s signature “dictator chic” style—the boxy suits and bright red ties, massive eponymous gold signs on his properties, emphasis on “classical” architecture, and so on.
What’s the actual backstory here?
This Jan. 3, 2020, photo was taken during an Evangelicals for Trump rally at the Ministerio Internacional El Rey Jesus megachurch in Miami, one of the largest Hispanic churches in the country. The visit came on the heels of an editorial in Christianity Today calling for Trump’s removal from office and was part of his campaign strategy to shore up his evangelical voter base and attract more Latino supporters.
According to Insider, the “Never give up!” sign was gifted to Trump during the rally by an evangelical supporter who had helped provide hurricane relief in Florida.
Sure, sure, but what did Trump think of the sign?
“I like this. This is pretty nice,” Trump said at the rally. “I never give up. We’ll never give up. … My administration will never stop fighting for Americans of faith.”
Why is this the weird photo of the week?
Clearly Trump, who still refuses to admit defeat in the 2020 election, took this advice to heart.
