 "How did Donald Trump make ‘YMCA’ his go-to song?")
It’s a song that has become synonymous with Donald Trump. “YMCA”, the 1970s hit, has become a staple at the president-elect’s rallies and other gatherings. On the eve of his Inauguration, the song filled the air at the “MAGA Victory” rally held at Capital One Arena in Washington, DC.
Trump grooved once again, showing off his now-viral dance moves as the Village People’s performance concluded the rally. We can expect to see more. As the disco group will also perform at one of the president-elect’s inaugural balls on January 20 (Monday) after he takes oath.
🚨 NOW: President Trump is dancing to YMCA ON STAGE with the Village People
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) January 19, 2025
This is incredible! 🤣 pic.twitter.com/BIcIJyudr5
Days before the inauguration weekend, the lead singer of the Village People, Victor Willis wrote on Facebook, “We know this won’t make some of you happy to hear however we believe that music is to be performed without regard to politics.
“Our song YMCA is a global anthem that hopefully helps bring the country together after a tumultuous and divided campaign where our preferred candidate lost. Therefore, we believe it’s now time to bring the country together with music which is why Village People will be performing at various events as part of the 2025 Inauguration of Donald J Trump.”
Trump’s groovy for YMCA
If you have been following US politics even a little, you will know that Donald Trump, the US president-elect is a fan of the 1978 song by the Village People. Rallies, dinners — everywhere Trump has been, the song has played out loud in the skies.
On Sunday (January 19), the song will be heard once again at the president-elect’s ‘Victory Rally’ at Capital One Arena in DC. But even before that, the YMCA has been featured at his campaign rallies and even at his parties.
It dates back to 2018 during a rally in Mississippi, notes _The Time_s. “Now we’re replacing the horrible job-killing Nafta (North American Free Trade Agreement) with a brand new US-Mexico Canada agreement which is a really good deal for us,” he said. “The USMCA! Like YMCA, the song YMCA.” Then he sang the chorus. “Y-M-C-A!” Anyone struggling to remember the trade deal should think of the song, he said. “We love that song.”
Later, in October 2020, a freshly Covid-free Donald Trump hoisted his fists into the air, revelling in his recovery onstage at a Florida political rally with the YMCA song playing loud in the background. Soon, the song was heard blaring over loudspeakers at the Michigan State Capitol as militia members protested Covid restrictions. Some protesters even switched the letters YMCA to MAGA.
Since then, Trump has ensured that the song is featured at his events. Through his many campaign rallies for last year’s presidential election, the YMCA played out with Trump grooving to it. Who can forget the US president-elect grooving to the disco hit at his Madison Square Garden rally in October? Even First Lady to-be Melania couldn’t help but chuckle at Trump’s moves.
Later, even when Trump declared his victory after the elections, he broke out into his ‘Trump dance’ at the end of his address in Florida.
Donald Trump finished his speech and did a victory dance to the song Y.M.C.A. by the band Village People pic.twitter.com/xmevts0PXM
— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) November 6, 2024
And later, Trump once again broke out into dance when he heard the YMCA at Mar-a-Lago during his New Year’s party. The video of a suited Trump grooving to the disco hit in the presence of his ‘First Buddy’ Elon Musk soon went viral.
🚨HAPPY NEW YEAR: President Trump and Elon Musk just celebrated the New Year by dancing to YMCA together!
— Bo Loudon (@BoLoudon) January 1, 2025
God bless these American heroes! pic.twitter.com/ony1Ka0BmK
A disco lover, feelgood factor and nostalgia
But what’s behind Trump’s love for the song, YMCA? Is he a secret lover of disco music? That’s hardly the reason why the 1978 song has blared out through loudspeakers at almost every Trump event. Some believe that the groovy song with thumping beats is a guarantee to get crowds enthused. It’s a feel-good song with lyrics reading: “There’s no need to feel down… pick yourself off the ground.”
That’s perhaps the biggest reason Trump chooses to play the song to get the crowds going. As the BBC notes, “Trump takes pride in the perception that his rallies have the populist razzmatazz of a sports match or a rock concert – so the feelgood hit makes sense as their crowd-friendly soundtrack.”
But, it’s not just about having fun. Dr A Jamie Saris, an Associate Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Maynooth University, notes that playing the YMCA at his events has a lot to do with nostalgia. “I don’t think you can separate Trump and his base from nostalgia,” Dr Saris told the BBC. “They want a do-over. That is, they want to relive certain moments that they have in their brains as when America was great; they just don’t want to deal with the contradictions. Disco was problematic for a lot of kids at the time, but now the same people who used to be uncomfortable with it are saying, ‘The 1970s were great! My back didn’t hurt’!”
There’s also the fact that many of Trump’s supporters are seen dressing up — some in Vietnam War aesthetic, others in versions of Special Ops uniform and others in blue-collar clothes. Compare this to the Village People who also dressed up as a policeman, a soldier, a cowboy, an Indigenous American chief, a construction worker, and a leather-clad biker. All of these are still-admired images of American masculinity.
Boosting YMCA’s popularity
Whatever the reason behind Trump’s decision to feature the song, one thing is certain: it has made the disco hit a talking point in recent days. The song has skyrocketed on the Billboard charts , 40 years after it was first released. The irony is that even at its peak, the song never went past number two in the US Billboard’s Hot 100 and US Dance Club songs.
The dance has also caught on outside of Trump’s political orbit with athletes mimicking his moves when they celebrate on the field. Even his granddaughter, Kai Trump, re-enacted his moves to the song in a now-viral TikTok, saying: “Learned these moves from the best.”
Trump’s use of the song has also helped the band, the Village People, rake in some serious moolah. Even Willis, who at one time had asked Trump to refrain from using the song, acknowledged this. “The financial benefits have been great, as YMCA is estimated to gross several million dollars since the President-elect’s continued use of the song,” Willis acknowledged in a Facebook post in December 2024.
Origins of YMCA
For those who don’t know, the YMCA was released by the Village People in 1978. A song with a funky rhythm, and catchy lyrics, it was co-written by its French producer, Jacques Morali, and its singer, Victor Willis. Interestingly, the famous arm movements that are now synonymous with the song were added for a performance on the TV show American Bandstand in 1979.
Soon, the disco anthem became popular with the gay community, some even going as far as making it the community’s anthem. It is ironic, considering today Trump — who is perceived to be anti-LGBTQ — has adopted it as his anthem. Many interpreted the song as an ode to the delights of picking up sexual partners at them.
However, Willis insists that the song has nothing to do with homosexuality. “That is a false assumption based on the fact that my writing partner was gay, and some (not all) of Village People were gay, and that the first Village People album was totally about gay life,” he said. People falsely assumed that YMCA “must be a message to gay people … it is not”, he wrote in a Facebook post in December, threatening to sue anyone who said otherwise.
“I knew nothing about the Y being a hang-out for gays,” he added. Instead, he had been thinking “about the things I knew about the Y in the urban areas of San Francisco such as swimming, basketball, track, and cheap food and cheap rooms. And when I say, ‘hang out with all the boys’ that is simply 1970s Black slang for Black guys hanging out together for sports, gambling or whatever. There’s nothing gay about that.”
But regardless of all this, the YMCA is a banger. And we can’t wait to see if Trump grooves to the hit once again, come January 20.
With inputs from agencies
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