Donald Trump’s fake tan has been a hot topic of conversation while he has been on the presidential campaign trail. When he debated Kamala Harris on September 10, Trump’s uneven tan was mocked on X, formerly Twitter. “Trump needs to watch some youtube makeup tutorials,” one viewer wrote. The republican presidential nominee then spoke at the Ed Fry Arena in Pennsylvania on September 23. During the speech, he hit a few problematic talking points while wading into the waters of the abortion issue. Fumbling over the women’s rights topic was not the most embarrassing part of Trump’s night though, as his fake tan was on full display.
Photos from the rally showed Trump addressing the crowd while raising his hands to his ears. The juxtaposition in skin tone between his pale hands and dark orange face made his fake tan stunningly obvious. In another shot, the one-time president pointed to the crowd, and his face looked burnt orange in comparison to his digits.
Not long before his fake tan fail in Pennsylvania, makeup artist Kriss Blevens spoke about working on the former president’s look in the past. “I can tell you that, at times, his face looked bronzer than the rest of him, and that was before makeup,” Blevens told Fast Company on September 9. “My guess was he relied on some self-tanners to try to maintain a certain look that he’d come to feel healthy in from living in Florida,” the makeup artist added.
Donald Trump fires back at photo seemingly exposing his fake tan
In a hilarious case of the pot calling the kettle black (or carrot-colored), Donald Trump fired shots at Joe Biden’s orange tan fail in July. On the heels of their presidential debate, many pointed out that the president looked pale. Biden was then ridiculed online for looking several shades darker shortly after the debate. Trump decided to get in on the action and posted a side-by-side photo of Biden to Truth Social which showed the difference in the president’s skin tone after only four days, per The Telegraph.
Of course, the former host of “The Apprentice” has a good eye for spotting fake tans. During his presidency, a photo went viral that seemingly exposed Trump’s two-tone face in February 2020. The snap caught Trump with his hair swept back by the wind, and there was a stark tan line around his face. Naturally, Trump denounced the evidence. “More Fake News. This was photoshopped, obviously, but the wind was strong and the hair looks good? Anything to demean!” he wrote on X at the time while quote-tweeting the image.
A few years later during his trial in November 2023, multiple candid photos painted unflattering images of Trump, whose eye bags clashed with his tan at the trial.
