How Trump’s favorite anthem became the barometer for his policies

“The so-called ‘nation-builders’ wrecked far more nations than they built,” said Donald Trump on stage in Riyadh at the joint US-Saudi Arabia investment conference in May. “The interventionists were intervening in complex societies that they did not even understand themselves.”

Calling time on the neoconservative framework for diplomacy – also known as waging war – was jaw-dropping enough. But President Trump wasn’t done. He wanted to celebrate.

Wrapping up his speech, the self-proclaimed President of “common sense” brought his friend, the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, onto the stage to commemorate the moment. Naturally, the speakers blasted out the President’s favorite anthem: the Village People’s “YMCA.”

Millions of Americans will insist they don’t think President Trump is funny. I find this hard to believe. You may not want to laugh; you may hate yourself just a little bit for giggling along, involuntarily. But the President has the ability to be hilarious, especially when he’s on to something. And boy was he on to something in Riyadh.

It’s a personal motto for the President, representing his brushes with death – politically and literally

A seismic geopolitical shift took place on that stage, as Trump swapped bombs for business and called for peace. You could see the change in the Saudi sheikhs and oligarchs as they stood up and clapped along to America’s favorite gay anthem. No, the speech itself did not fortify human rights across authoritarian countries, legalize gay relationships in Saudi Arabia or resolve the myriad complex conflicts across the region. But neither have the wars fought, and lost, by the West over the past quarter-century. And wars are far less amusing.

Instead, in his tour of the Middle East, Trump conjured up hope that there might be a way forward – building rather than annihilating. The kind of hope that makes you laugh and smile at the same time. Young man, there really is no need to feel down: we’re no longer sending you off to fight in endless wars for causes no one can name.

Trump has always had an affinity for “YMCA,” which he plays at his campaign rallies, sometimes even dancing along. But its prominence in MAGA circles exploded during Covid, when the anti-lockdown movement would blast the song – a stark reminder of what it means to live your life fully and that no life is lived better alone.

For Trump, it morphed from a fun song to dance to into one that represented his movement. It’s a personal motto for the President, representing his brushes with death – politically and literally.

Without knowing it, Trump has created the perfect barometer for telling whether his policies and ideas are good ones. If you played “YMCA” as the outro to the latest announcement, would it force a smile? Or come across as completely inappropriate? Bringing peace to the Middle East? It’s fun to stay at the YMCA! Returning basic freedoms to your citizens as the threats of a global pandemic subside? There’s no need to be unhappy! Rolling back regulations that demand low-pressure shower heads? You can get yourself clean, you can have a good meal, you can do whatever you feel!

Likewise, it’s painfully clear when the anthem should not be deployed; when to even hover near the play button would be a dangerous game. Blow-ups in the Oval Office leave no one in a particularly joyful mood. The market mayhem Trump created after so-called “Liberation Day” needed the Jaws soundtrack or the Psycho screeches as the underscore to plummeting red lines on television screens. No one was dancing: not the traders on Wall Street or the savers in the Rust Belt who voted for a better economy. They didn’t think it was the time to spell out the letters YMCA with their bodies. As it happens, it was also awful policy.

You can’t hum the tune alongside footage of deportations, either. It’s too jarring. The expulsion of Kilmar Abrego García to an El Salvador mega-prison without due process is an event MAGA-world will broadly defend, emphasizing his alleged links to gang crime. But if you raise the question about how a future Democratic administration might use this precedent – along with questions about who might be targeted next – some doubt creeps in, especially for Trump voters outside the MAGA movement. They suspect such actions won’t be consequence-free.

The relationship between Trump and the Village People has been far from seamless. The group’s campaign manager sent a cease-and-desist letter to the President in 2023 after “Macho Man” was played at one of his rallies. But the group came around, happy to spread a message of inclusivity, and eventually performed at Trump’s second inaugural weekend. It hasn’t hurt the band’s pockets either, with lead singer Victor Willis pointing out that Trump’s publicizing “YMCA” pushed the song into the number one spot on the Billboard chart.

“Young man, what do you wanna be?” asks the song. For Trump, the answer, for decades, has been President of the United States. His relationship with the electorate has been rocky, too, yet there is something deathlessly pop about Trump’s ruthless pursuit of profit and glory.

Perhaps that’s why “YMCA” makes for the perfect yardstick for his presidency. If Trump’s advocating for the country, we all, deep down, want to sing. When he’s not, there is very little to celebrate.

This article was originally published in The Spectator’s July 2025 World edition.