From Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg to the Village People, it seems like everyone is sucking up to Donald Trump these days. But the folks at Coca-Cola have really managed to distinguish themselves by giving the president-elect an honor that is dumb, unnecessary, and hypocritical.
On Tuesday night, Margo Martin, Trump’s deputy director of communications, announced on X that he had “received the first ever Presidential Commemorative Inaugural Diet Coke bottle,” along with a photo of Coca-Cola Company chairman and CEO James Quincey personally presenting it to Trump.
Martin’s post is somewhat misleading; Trump is not the first president to receive a commemorative Coke bottle. The note shown in the second photo reads, “We’re proud to continue our decades-long tradition of celebrating the U.S. presidential inauguration with a commemorative [bottle].”
A Coca-Cola Company spokesperson told Fox News Digital that the company has created Coke bottles for each presidential inauguration “dating back to 2005.” Indeed, there are plenty of Coke bottles marking presidential inaugurations — and even gubernatorial inaugurations — available on eBay.
But it seems Trump is the first to receive a Diet Coke bottle, in a nod to his legendary love of that particular Coke variant.
While this is not a new “honor,” the way the Coca-Cola Company went about bestowing it is still embarrassing.
Trump already loves Diet Coke as much as any human can love a carbonated beverage. He reportedly consumed around 12 servings per day when he was in the White House. He installed a “Diet Coke Button,” and the man who answered the buzzer’s call — earning the nickname “Diet Coke Valet” — became a trusted aide (and co-defendant).
None of this prevented Trump from calling for a boycott of Coke in 2021, along with other companies that spoke out against Georgia’s new voting-rights restrictions.
Coca-Cola could have taken this as a sign that nothing will ensure Trump’s loyalty and quietly sent him the same commemorative Coke glass every other president receives. Instead, the company tried to make a cute gesture to Trump’s Diet Coke addiction and had its CEO hand-deliver the package.
All this gesture managed to do was generate headlines about how Coca-Cola is hypocritically sucking up to Trump four years after declaring that his supporters’ attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, was “an offense to the ideals of American democracy.”
But, hey, at least Trump is a little happier with the company that produces his main source of hydration — at least, until Coca-Cola ticks him off again.
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