As if the presidential race hadn’t been interesting enough, witches have now entered the fold. Yeni Sleidi gathered her fellow brujas, asked them to perform a series of curses on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and recorded footage of the rituals. The end result is an energetic video titled, “Brujas Hex Trump.” Yeni, a writer and activist from Brooklyn, was inspired to make the video after chatting with her Santeria-practicing mother.




Yeni asked if there was anything she could do, spell-wise, to thwart Trump’s electoral efforts. “We’re both Cuban immigrants and his misguided attack on Mexican immigrants hit close to home, so she was happy to help.” Her mom gave instructions on a traditional “name-in-the-freezer” hex, and the video shows Yeni invoking the “Ice Queen” to freeze Trump’s idiotic cabeza.

As the saying goes, there’s always strength in numbers, so Yeni’s friends contributed an array of spells for ol’ Trump. The magical menu included a hex to silence him, another to protect people of color from his evil and one that would make him mourn the loss of his infamous comb-over. That’s right—a hair loss curse.


Though Yeni says not everyone who worked on the video believes in the supernatural, they all wholeheartedly believe that Trump and the rest of the GOP are garbage. “Even if the hexes don’t work, the video shows Mexicans that they’ve got plenty of good people on their side,” Yeni explained. I asked Yeni if there was a presidential candidate she’d cast a good luck spell for. She affirmed those blessings would be given to Bernie Sanders. “I’m not one of his crazed #feelthebern supporters, but I think he’s the only candidate who isn’t entirely disingenuous, especially since he released his racial justice platform.”

Suzy X, a writer and lead singer of Shady Hawkins, one of the bands who contributed music to the video, describes witchcraft as being much more than love spells, Tarot cards and natal charts. “The central essence of the witch is and has always been political resistance,” said Suzy. “Witches were born out of their natural resistance to patriarchy, to the level of greed and entitlement that produces scumlords like Donald Trump. We need to re-politicize the witch, the way feminists did in the ‘70s. Let’s take advantage of their existing fear of women, of immigrants, of black and brown folks. And let’s have a little fun with it.”