Companies including Tecate and Cucapá are using humor to push back against the Republican’s fighting talk (and market their products)

When a group of young Mexicans began selling “I support Donald” T-shirts to people on the streets of Los Angeles last month they drew reactions of anger and disbelief from many passersby.



The joke was on the buyers. As temperatures rose a clown nose appeared on the Republican presidential candidate and the wording on the shirts changed, crossing out “I support” and leaving “El Que Lo Lea,” which translates to “whoever reads this” but is a nod for any Mexican Spanish speaker to the popular phrase: “Whoever reads this is an asshole.”

The prank was part of a viral marketing campaign by the Mexican craft brewery Cucapá, with the sales destined to fund free beer giveaways and a big party in Mexico City.



Cucapá’s stunt was the latest in a series of advertising campaigns by Mexican businesses that have mocked and criticised the Republican candidate for his racist rhetoric.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Mexican brewer Cucapá takes to the streets of Los Angeles to troll Trump.

Mario García, the Cucapá founder, said the company came up with the idea after Trump’s surprise visit to Mexico in August. Upon returning to the US, Trump triumphantly proclaimed: “Mexico will pay for the wall, 100%. They don’t know it yet, but they’re going to pay.”



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A native of the border town of Mexicali, García responded to Trump’s latest affront by organising the T-shirt sales and posting footage online with the message: “Someone tell Donald he paid for our beers”. The videos went viral, with Cucapá claiming they clocked up 8.3m views and 500,000 interactions within 10 days.



“As Mexicans we all feel extremely offended and we have the right to defend ourselves,” said García, whose firm sells border-related ales with names like Green Card, Runaway and La Migra, the Mexican slang term for immigration officials. “As a beer company I don’t think we’re going to reach young people by taking a formal political stance, but instead we can stay true to ourselves by taking a more humorous, irreverent stance.”



Trump has been loathed in Mexico ever since decrying its people as criminals, rapists and drug-dealers when he launched his campaign last year. With Trump urging the US to stop doing business with its southern neighbour, it was only a matter of time before Mexican companies began to respond.



Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) I have a lawsuit in Mexico’s corrupt court system that I won but so far can’t collect. Don’t do business with Mexico!

Tecate, a Mexican beer company owned by Heineken, released a commercial on Fox News during the first presidential debate that mocked Trump’s planned border wall. In its place, Tecate proposed a new wall, “tremendous” mini beer wall, more like a very long bar, where people from both countries could meet to share ice-cold Mexican lager. “This wall may be small but it’s going to be huge,” claimed the ad.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Tecate proposes building a ‘beer wall’ between Mexico and the US.

“Being a Mexican brand, we almost felt the obligation to play into this conversation,” said Felix Palau, vice-president of Tecate USA. “We really wanted to address this notion of a wall. However, we wanted to put a positive spin on it, while raising a glass to beer’s uncanny ability to bring people together.”

He’s an easy target. It’s very difficult to find a Mexican who likes Donald Trump Fernanda Guerra, marketing director

Larger corporations like Corona and Aeromexico have launched more subtle campaigns that also question the concept of borders, while Mexican and Argentine TV networks have used Trump’s inflammatory comments about immigrants to promote football matches taking place in the US. “We don’t have victories anymore. The American dream is dead,” Azteca, Mexico’s second largest media company, quoted Trump saying in its promotions for September’s USA v Mexico soccer match.



It’s unusual for Mexican businesses to release such political commercials. Fernanda Guerra, director of the digital marketing firm Wawa, said Mexican companies normally avoid such delicate issues for fear of losing clients or undermining important relationships. While smaller, more irreverent brands like Cucapá have less to lose from releasing bolder adverts, Guerra said larger corporations tend to be more serious and risk averse. In Trump’s case, however, companies of all sizes are taking shots at him.



“He’s an easy target. It’s very difficult to find a Mexican who likes Donald Trump,” Guerra explained. “He’s someone who’s been attacking Mexican society so there’s a common sense that he’s our enemy.”



The strength of anti-Trump sentiment on both sides of the border has created opportunities for philanthropy as well as publicity. Since launching a Trump-baiting viral campaign last year, John Rexer, founder of the Mexican liquor brand Ilegal Mezcal, has raised over $30,000 to provide educational opportunities for children in Guatemala and undocumented youths in Los Angeles and his native New York.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Illegal Mezcal takes a shot at Trump

Inspired by a conversation with a distressed Mexican waiter in a New York restaurant, Rexer began mocking up posters of Trump’s face with a phrase the immigrant had used: “Donald eres un pendejo” (Donald you’re an asshole). His team quickly put up over 5,000 posters, projections and spray-paintings across several major US cities.



Ilegal Mezcal is now selling T-shirts with the same design to raise money for charity. In April they donated $2 for every shot of their liquor that customers consumed at 75 bars across three continents as part of a mass drinking protest dubbed “A shot at Donald”.



“Some people have been shocked, asking, ‘Should companies be taking this kind of stance?’” said Rexer, a former Mexico resident who now lives in Guatemala. “It takes some degree of risk for a brand to take a political point of view but I think Mexican brands have a responsibility to their own people. They do business with the US and they should be concerned with [Trump’s] tone, that not only affects them business-wise but also affects the bigger picture.”

