The Trump Org Sort Of Launches A New Half-Assed Wireless Phone Company, Trump Mobile
from the lazy-garbage-for-rubes dept
Never one to miss an opportunity to exploit the presidency for a quick and tacky buck, the Trump administration is getting into the cell phone business.
Well, sort of: the Trump administration is launching a lazy new MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) that piggybacks on existing wireless networks with an added perk: a fake-gold $500 “T1” phone celebrating everyone’s favorite reality TV star turned incoherent authoritarian zealot.
The phone image appears to be a lazy Photoshop of a phone without a flash, suggesting this device is probably nowhere close to actually existing yet:
The new Trump Mobile service launches in September, and will offer a $47.45-per-month plan that includes unlimited talk, text and data, as well as roadside assistance and a “Telehealth and Pharmacy Benefit.” The Trump org claims the phone was “made in the USA,” which pretty much guarantees stories around six to eight months from now revealing the phones were all made in China (from Trump family press appearances there are already indications this is probably a lie).
The Verge notices that the press release for the gambit has a bunch of lazy errors, including RAM that’s described as storage, and the promise of a “5000mAh long life camera”; terminology that actually refers to battery capacity. The Trump Mobile terms of use say the network is really just a rebranding of another MAGA-friendly MVNO, Liberty Mobile, which runs on the (also Trump friendly) T-Mobile network.
These MVNOs have become a dime a dozen. Such networks (increasingly owned by celebrities), usually spend a few years pretending to be a serious pro-consumer venture, offering lower-cost cell phone plans with limited device options and a bunch of weird network restrictions and caveats buried in the fine print.
Once (if) the brand becomes valuable, it’s usually sold off to one of the major three carriers, who then steadily make the service shittier and shittier before sunsetting the brand. Wash, rinse, repeat.
There have been a lot of these half-assed MAGA MVNOs. Like Patriot Mobile, which you might recall was supposed to be a MAGA-friendly wireless phone service that claimed to be sticking it to AT&T — because AT&T briefly refused to carry right wing propaganda channel OAN (despite AT&T coming up with the idea for OAN and funding its creation!). Which network did the service run on? AT&T.
There’s occasionally an exception, but generally these kinds of MVNOs are a silly pump-and-dump gambit that helps prop up the idea that U.S. telecom is more competitive than it is, which of course makes it perfect for the Trump administration.
This one seems particularly lazy. Scratch at the surface, and Trump Mobile winds up being little more than a brand and a license agreement, according to the Trump Mobile website fine print:
“Trump Mobile, its products and services are not designed, developed, manufactured, distributed or sold by The Trump Organization or any of their respective affiliates or principals.”
From Trump high tops to Trump bibles, there’s no shortage of low-quality Trump cack attempting to exploit the presidency for a quick and lazy buck (the admin made $8 million in such agreements in 2024). But in between destroying the rule of law and teeing up race riots, Trump’s underlings have been busy significantly ramping up such deals in 2025, including a looming new line of Trump home goods.
In many ways Trump continues to be the perfect reflection of this country’s obsession with artifice. We built a giant golem out of trash, garbage and the shallowest, tackiest bullshit imaginable, and it’s now eating us alive. With any luck the entire violent experiment will be available for pennies on the shelves of your local Good Will before too long.
Filed Under: competition, mobile, telecom, wireless
Companies: liberty mobile, t-mobile, trump mobile, trump organization
Comments on “The Trump Org Sort Of Launches A New Half-Assed Wireless Phone Company, Trump Mobile”
Can we please have an app that blocks access from an entire network?
Money laundering anyone? Crypto wasn’t enough.
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Ninja is back! Hi Ninja.
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Not quite but I’m around a bit more! Cheers
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Just wait until we find out who this phone is mining crypto for.
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Sour Grapes
The parallel economy is fast approaching. The political pendulum always eventually swings the other way. But when it does, there’s going to be alternatives for phones and social media network and more. The 2021-2024 playbook isn’t going to work again.
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You understand nothing apparently
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As usual, I can’t find a better way to say this than with a Simpsons quote:
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You sound even more deranged than normal, Koward. There already are alternatives in choices of phone and social media networks.
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Only Koby could defend the MAGA president making product lines in China
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Grifting isn’t an economy. MAGA needs liberals to continue to fund their stupidity,they can’t operate without a giant cash cow.
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Yes, it’s sour grapes when people decry the elected leader of a country completely discarding any semblance of concern for the appearance, much less the active engagement in, corruption and greedy proifteering. This is why everyone looks at you funny when you make absurd statements like “the country needs to be run like a business,” while being run by people who treat their businesses as unethical money-grabs.
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What “2021-2024 playbook”? Good governance and reasonable economic growth?
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You weren’t mainlining the propaganda that Koby was snorting during the Biden years. As far as he knows, whole cities burned down, Biden personally stood at the border welcoming in millions of terrorists and welfare queens, millions of conservatives died from oxygen depravation from being physically forced at gunpoint to wear a mask, and roving bands of government agents broke into homes to vaccinate people against their will.
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FTFY. YW.
Of course the phone will be a piece of schlock.
TACO = Trump Always Cheaps Out
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It should be TAKO = Trump Always Koby’s Out
The Trump org claims the phone was “made in the USA,” which pretty much guarantees stories around six to eight months from now revealing the phones were all made in China […]
How about six to eight minutes from now?
Trump Mobile’s made-in-US iPhone 17 competitor is really made in China
Like everything that punk loser Trump does, it’s a cheap scam designed to fool the suckers.
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Was he even trying to hide it ?
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Considering that they claimed it was “made in the USA”, it seems like he was.
Hopefully, the phone’s default ringtone is the theme to Goldfinger.
as well as roadside assistance and a “Telehealth and Pharmacy Benefit.”
Translation: The Trump Circus, including Kennedy jr, will also have full access to your location and health data, so enjoy your spam calls, texts, and emails, demanding you report to a nearby polling place to cast your ballot for whatever nutty shit you are supposed to support that day. The customer with the most selfies taken with a ballot submission can win Trump’s shiny red Tesla. Also, enjoy the feigned concern from some AI bot pestering you to stop by some nearby quackery practitioner to have those disturbing declines in your health stats assessed, while browsing the wide selection of healing oils, conveniently sorted in order of how scientific the made up names sound. “10 percent discount on the potions whose names have more than 5 syllables and end with ‘drin'”!!!
Made in the USA
Do they? The link after this sentence is broken, and the Trump Mobile page says “Our MADE IN THE USA ‘T1SM Phone’ is available for pre-order now”—which suggests a claim that it will be made in the USA, rather than a past-tense claim that it “was”. And they’ve basically now confirmed that.
It’s unclear whether people pre-ordering the “MADE IN THE USA” phone will actually get one made in the USA (which the reporting suggests can’t happen within the next few years), or will fraudulently get one made elsewhere. But, anyway, even if the “made in” goal is reached, it’ll probably be mostly a box-checking exercise. It’s the FTC, now being neutered, who decide what that phrase means—and, specifically, how much foreign content is acceptable.
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You know how when you pre-order a games console, you’re not ordering a unit that will be made, but rather one that has been made and will soon be available for retail sale? It’s the exact same situation here, lies and hypocrisy included.
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Um, no, I’ve never heard of that, and I don’t know anyone with that expectation. If it exists, isn’t that just an “order”?
Wikipedia says that pre-orders are used, in part, so that “manufacturers can gauge how much demand there will be and thus the size of initial production runs”—which means that (at least some of) the pre-orders would be for products that haven’t yet been manufactured.
It’s still fraud to advertise one product for pre-order, and then send something else—such as sending a made-in-Taiwan product when the pre-order was for made-in-USA (as the Trump Phone pre-order page clearly advertises). I won’t be surprised if that happens, and if the government lets them get away with it. But, for now, we’re still waiting to see. And I still haven’t seen them claim any non-prototype phones have already been made in the USA.
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On the store’s part, yes. On the customer’s part, no, because the store doesn’t yet have the item for sale. Hence the term “pre-order”. Are you seriously this lacking in understanding or is your obtuseness deliberate?
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Um, nope. You’re the only one that doesn’t seem to understand how preorders work”>.
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The page you linked literally says “it allows businesses to gauge demand and plan inventory more effectively. This approach enables retailers to manage cash flow better and reduce the risk of overproduction.” And then goes on to say “Additionally, pre-orders improve cash flow by securing sales in advance. This advantage can be crucial for funding production and reducing financial risks.”
These things can only be true if at least some of the pre-orders are for products that do not yet exist. (How could pre-order cash be used to build the units, or to adjust the number built, if everything were already built?) Which is basically the same as what Wikipedia said.
Spray paint a pig
Spray paint a pig of a phone with goldish paint somewhere in deepest darkest Florida and suddenly you’ve got a phone ‘made in America’ as far as the average MAGA is able to tell.
Add a $47.45 per month charge for a service that costs pennies to actually run, and you’re in the money!!
Perfect GOP grift.
Now the Donald just needs to find a Faux News talking head to promote it, then become the CEO of the ‘Trump Network’… where Truth (anti-)Social is the only social media app you’ll ever need.
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Make sure the spray paint, painter, and phone factory are all from China as well. That’s how we make America great again!
The perfect phone for ordering TACO’s.
'A Trump-brand robot that kicks me in the nuts? Shut up and take my money!'
The most pathetic thing is that it’s guaranteed to be wildly successful just because they slapped his name on it, simply because that’s all that’s required for his cultists to start forking over their money.
best part?
the “service agreement” says they can activate your camera and microphone AT ANY TIME WITHOUT WARNING.
They ‘reserve the right’ to keep copies of all voice calls, SMS, text and app messages.
All documents on the device BELONG to Trump Mobile, in their entirety. So that new awesome business plan? use this device and its not yours anymore. You just signed over all patents, copyrights AND trademarks!
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Counterpoint: Anyone stupid enough to get one of those phones wasn’t going to be coming up with any groundbreaking ideas worth stealing to begin with, and any business that employs them is better off knowing sooner rather than later how dumb that particular employee is.
i’m surprised he didn’t claim the phone is “5G-free” as a sop to the weirdass conspiracy crowd. “The T1 – it actually uses a T1 line. T1 line not included.”
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Don’t worry. My retiree mom said that 5G is okay now because they fixed it and it won’t radioactively murder you anymore. You just have to buy a newer phone. This from the same woman who thought consuming enough cinnamon would cure covid. She has some homeopathic remedies and essential oils if you’re buying.
This is the Escobar phone all over again, gold paint included.
$47.45 = 47th and 45th president ..as if we need a reminder.
I’ll hit a decade on Mint Mobile later this month. For $200 per year after tax, title, license and dealer prep, my data has gone from 2GB to 5GB.
There are of course MVNO shenanigans going on, but they’re scarcely universal.
It would be deeply appropriate for this phone to be made of iron pyrites, aka “fool’s gold”.
Made possible by Peter Thiel. Powered by Palantir.
And if it ever does, I, for one, will not be spending any of my money on it.