With his approval classification, New Yorkers seem to have lost confidence in their mayor Eric Adams. But Mr. Adams is in the front where he is now placing his own trust: with God.
On Tuesday, Mr Adams, who announced that he would re-election, not as a democrat, but as an independent, appeared at a press conference with a T-shirt with the words “in God we trust”, printed above an American flag.
“This outfit is not a campaign, this outfit is my life,” Mr Adams told reporters when he was asked about the white shirt, which seemed to be about as premium as something bought at a boardwalk souvenir -stall.
“I went through hell for 15 months and everything I had was God,” said Mr Adams, referring to the federal corruption declarations that had been dropped against him this month.
Mr Adams is not the only political figure that brings the graphic T-shirt into formal political spaces.
During the prime-time address of President Trump at the beginning of March, a cluster of Democrats Slogan-T-shirts wore a cotton-based blow back back for the President’s Speech Points. A few swollen in the recognizable text: “Resist”. Representative of Florida, Maxwell Frost, the first Gen-Z-member of the congress, wore a tee with the slogan “No Kings Live here”.
Elon Musk, in his role as presidential adviser, has brought Gamer-Bro-Mode to the West Wing. In February, while he seemed to be the department heads during the first cabinet meeting of the Trump administration, Mr. Musk wore a dark shirt with the words ‘technical support’.
With its block -like font and Winky word play, it has channeled the visual language of an internet meme. So it was little surprise that the “Tech Support” shirt became his own meme that circulated on X. Sell similar T pieces on Amazon for $ 19.
Kamala Harris offered an earlier, recent example of the graphic tee in politics, when she wore a T -shirt last October with “Detroit vs. Everybody” under a blazer while campaigning in Michigan. It was a tailor reaction to Mr Trump, who said days earlier: “Our entire country will be like Detroit if she is your president,” referring to Mrs. Harris. With the shirt, Mrs. Harris noted a viral moment that lived on after her speech.
Although supporters have long worn political T-shirts (from “Dew-it-With Dewey” to “Bernie 2020”), there is a novelty for politicians to graphic T-pieces.
“This is generally a new phenomenon as politicians become more casual, less formal and as our news culture becomes more visual,” said Peter Loge, a university teacher media and public affairs at George Washington University.
More Billboard than garment
When Mr. Trump made the first America great again, he again hated a era of political communication that is loudly, literally and often screens.
“The T-shirt says:” Here is what I’m standing for, I am one of you, I understand you, come with me, “said the Lord Lodge.
Mr. Trump has “broken this seal on this idea of politicians, even in their official capacity, who deals with very explicit brand activity,” says Joel Penney, associate professor at the School of Communication and Media at Montclair State University.
The fact that other politicians prefer t-shirts to hats, show how in-depth Mr Trump has had the political limit. Wearing a slogan hat would now be too transparent as ‘doing an asset’. Internationally, the hat is expressed with slogans such as “Canada is not for sale”, so that a message is sent to Trump’s conditions.
Nevertheless, politicians seem to have learned to speak and dress now on both sides of the aisle, in his direct, digestible and sometimes disturbing language.
Just like a hat “Make America Great Again”, the “No Kings Live Lord” shirt of Mr. Frost wore a memorable slogan that could also be interpreted as a portable scream at the opposition.
“The democratic T-shirts are a way to express anger or frustration,” said Mr Loge. Mr. Frost cleverly played the media moment of his shirt by from the speech of Mr. Trump to walk, allowing cameras to catch the full text that was printed on the back of the T-shirt as he came up the aisle. The shirt then served as a form of closed subtitles of protest.
In today’s kakophoneous political landscape, getting a word in-elke way that you can do, even with a Trite T-shirt preface on Decorum.
“Media come to people so quickly and furiously that I think politicians are looking for everything that can get a little purchase,” said Lori Poloni Studinger, Dean to the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Arizona.
Wearing your words has turned out to be a way to cut. At Gala 2021, an eruption of a large money affair, representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York wore an ivory-colored dress with “Tax the Rich” in red paint along the back, traiting days of discourse. During the first term of Mr. Trump, when his wife Melania Trump wore an olive jacket with the words “I really don’t care. Do you?” To visit an immigrant detention center, days of news debated about the reporting really meaning of the jacket.
The fact that the graphic T -shirt becomes the politician’s tool also shows how X -messages and Tiktok -Clips TV interviews have thoroughly conquered the medium that many voters suck up political images and news. Only a few thousand people have viewed a YouTube video of the news conference in which Mr. Adams wore the T-shirt “In God we trust”. Only a few tweet More than 36,000 times have been viewed over the shirt.
“If you can transfer a message with your T-shirt or something else, then in a way that can conquer the imagination of the public for at least a short period,” said Mrs. Poloni-Staudinger.
Still, Mr Lodge said, this is perhaps the exact level of complexity that today’s voters want to Their political talk points to come to them.
“We usually don’t think about politics,” said Mr Lodge. “And I don’t have to think about a T-shirt. I look at it and I get it.”
