August 14, 2015

Donald Trump’s TV Commercials: The Greatest Hits

He’s a real winner.

A face made for TV.Stephen B. Morton/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


As Donald Trump proudly observes whenever humanly possible, he’s rich. Richer than you, dear reader, and certainly richer than me.

A lot of that money has come from large-scale real estate ventures, but a decent chunk of change has come from his willingness to shill for seemingly any product that can get him in front of a camera. Over his decades in the public spotlight, Trump has regularly appeared on TV to hawk technology fads, pizza, or a comfortable night’s sleep. 

Mother Jones has previously chronicled Trump’s track record as a salesman of steaks and board games. Here is an incomplete compilation of his greatest commercial hits, culled from YouTube, demonstrating the full range of his shamelessness (or versatility, depending on your perspective) as a pitchman.

Trump and some creepy sheep sell a good night’s sleep on Trump-branded mattresses:

Even an adolescent can receive a late-night answering-machine message from Trump. All it takes is a Toshiba computer:

Trump and his then-wife Ivana share some pizza, though he eats his slice backward. Un-American!

With pizza, as with all things Trump, size matters:

Trump is a friend to all species, including the strange ones that hang around McDonald’s:

“The Donald Trump Era” begins on the World Wrestling Entertainment show Raw:

The GOP presidential poll leader doesn’t need to appear physically to sell his mattresses in North Carolina:

Bring the Trump lifestyle home and fall asleep:

A glimpse behind the scenes to see how the magic is made:

NBA star Kevin Garnett, of my hometown Minnesota Timberwolves, is among the greatest living Americans. A real winner! He also made an ad with Trump for Nike:

“The Fight Before the Fight,” apparently a string of Pepsi ads before a Mike Tyson fight, brought us this video, a reminder of just how long Trump has been followed by a giant swarm of press:

Video phones are the future! Trump says they are probably better business than real estate. On the other hand, who has ever heard of ACN?

What’s better than a normal Trump commercial? Double Trump:

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate