17617: On The White House & White Advertising Agencies, Part 11.

 

More About Advertising reported President Donald J. Trump aired a self-promotional video, prompting accusations that government funds were used to pay for a campaign advertisement.

The White House defended the video with a variety of legal and arguably looney responses.

It appears Trump is like the client—or White advertising agency—who greenlights executions without running concepts through the legal department.

Then again, maybe Trump is campaigning for a White Man Of The Year repeat.

Trump accused of using government funds for campaign advert

By Emma Hall

Only six weeks before the US midterm elections, President Trump has aired an ad providing a highlight reel of his second term and a promise that America will never be a communist country. The soundtrack repeats the words “Love me” over and over.

The controversial bit comes with the text overlay, “Paid for by the US government,” coupled with the timing – six weeks ahead of the critical mid-term elections. The White House denies using government funds to pay for a campaign ad, claiming that the work is a celebration of Trump and acts “as a reminder for Americans to love their country and know why it’s worth defending – at home, at the border, and abroad.”

The sped-up clips apparently include some of Trump’s signature moments like the US military raid on Venezuela, hosting a state dinner for Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, and accepting the FIFA peace prize, and pardoning a turkey.

The White House claims the ad is not campaigning and that “patriotism isn’t partisan,” but here he is boasting about his second-term achievements including tax cuts, manufacturing growth, and improved law and order. The broadcast version also features Dana White, CEO of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, saying “he is the toughest, most resilient human being I have ever met in my life.”

Albanian-American singer JMSN, who wrote and performed the song “Love me,” says he is “looking at lawyers” due to the unauthorised use of his work.

Further defence from the White House references Obama’s ads to promote Obamacare and Biden’s “We can do this” public health campaign. As Trump’s second term unfolds, it looks increasingly like he’s taking an ongoing trajectory to its logical extreme – and no one can stop him.

17416: ICYMI US Army RFI BS.

 

Advertising Age reported the US Army launched an RFI, moving in advance of an official account review process projected to start in spring 2027.

 

Given the anti-DEIBA+ positions of the White House and White advertising agencies, will multicrumbtual shops be denied the opportunity to participate and experience Prime Redlining?

 

US Army launches RFI for its $4 billion account, which is currently with Omnicom

 

By Brian Bonilla

 

The U.S. Army has begun laying the groundwork for a review of its multibillion-dollar marketing and advertising business, signaling a potential shake-up for one of the industry’s largest government accounts.

 

The government launched a “sources sought” and RFI on March 12, which is the first step leading up to an official review process slated to begin in late spring 2027.

 

The account was originally with DDB Chicago since 2018, before the agency was folded into TBWA after Omnicom’s acquisition of IPG.

 

The current contract is valued at up to $4 billion, which would seem to make the Army one of the agency’s largest accounts. The current contract is worth about $40 million annually in agency revenue for Omnicom, according to a person familiar with the contract, which is similar to what was reported when DDB initially won the business.

 

DDB’s contract included a five-year base period and “two award-term option periods,” for a total potential 10-year ordering period. It’s not known whether Omnicom is planning to defend the account. The contract is expected to conclude in 2028.

 

TBWA and the U.S. Army weren’t immediately available for comment.

 

The winning agency or agencies will be tasked with driving enlistment and retention across a broad set of audiences at a time when military recruitment has faced sustained challenges.

 

However, there have been recent signs of a turnaround. In January 2025, the U.S. Army had its best recruiting numbers in 15 years, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stated last year. After missing its recruitment goals in 2022 and 2023 by 15,000 troops a year, the government entity revised downward its goals and has since reached or exceeded them. In 2025, the U.S. Army surpassed its 60,000 recruit target by more than 1,000 recruits.

 

The RFI details wanting help to target high school and college students, working professionals under 35, specialized talent such as medical and legal professionals, as well as “influencers” such as parents, family members, high school counselors and coaches. It also includes a need for messaging aimed at veterans and recruits to fill civilian workforce positions.

 

The RFI implies that the U.S. Army is open to a one-agency solution or multiple agency partners, which is significant, according to Mike Kapetanovic, a business development consultant at GrowthLab, that is focused on supporting advertising and marketing agencies that work in the public sector.

 

Kapetanovic said there have been growing conversations around government entities pushing for a multiple-agency approach, which could be beneficial for mid-size and independent agencies and less so for holding companies such as Omnicom.

 

“Just the notion that the Army has gone on public record through this RFI exercise, it is contemplating a decentralization of this contract, has massive implications for both the incumbent as well as the future competitive set,” he said. “[If that’s done] there’s a very good chance that that $4 billion contract quickly becomes $50 million to $1 billion contracts in which Omnicom will not retain all of it. Right there, Omnicom gets an immediate hit.”

 

The selected partner or partners will be expected to handle a full suite of services, including creative development, media planning and buying, production, CRM, digital and website management, public relations, events, sponsorships and advanced analytics.

 

The value in winning a contract like this is not only its massive size, but its stability in an increasingly project-based and roster-first industry.

 

MullenLowe, which has been folded into TBWA as well, continues to do work for the government’s Joint Advertising, Market Research & Studies program (JAMRS), which is focused on recruiting volunteers for all branches of the military. MullenLowe retained the account in 2023 and launched a campaign last year called “You Have a Calling, We have an Answer.”

 

In 2024, WPP retained its Marine Corps account, which was previously with Wunderman Thompson before it was merged into VML.

 

Contributing: Ewan Larkin

17408: On The White House & White Advertising Agencies, Part 10.

President Donald J. Trump’s return to supremacy continues to mirror Adland.

 

The Independent reported Trump clumsily delivered a culturally clueless Pearl Harbor joke to a Japanese reporter and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.

 

Was Trump inspired by iconic Adman Jerry Della Femina?

 

Incidentally, the president’s comedy routine, well, bombed.

 

Trump cracks Pearl Harbor joke when pressed by Japanese reporter on lack of warning over Iran attack

 

Oval Office crowd left briefly silent after Trump makes light of 83-year-old attack

 

By Andrew Feinberg in Washington, D.C.

 

Just over 83 years ago, President Franklin Roosevelt called the Imperial Japanese Navy’s December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor “a date that will live in infamy” as he urged Congress to declare war.

 

On Thursday, President Donald Trump turned it into a punchline.

 

Trump was finishing up a question-and-answer session with reporters during a bilateral meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi when a Japanese journalist asked why he did not inform key American allies — such as Japan — before the start of the joint U.S.-Israeli air campaign against Iran on February 28.

 

The president initially replied that the U.S. “went in very hard” and “didn’t tell anybody about it because we wanted surprise.”

 

But Trump’s response took an awkward turn moments later when he said: “Who knows better about surprise than Japan?”

 

After some muted laughter from the U.S. officials who’d joined him for the meeting, he turned to Sanae — who was born two decades after the attack — to ask her another question.

 

“Why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor, OK?”

 

At that point, laughter turned to audible groans. The room went silent.

 

Takaichi, who spent two years in Washington working on Capitol Hill during the Reagan administration and has a strong command of English, was clearly taken aback by the president’s attempt at humor.

 

The smile she’d had on her face disappeared and her eyes widened as she realized what Trump had just said.

 

After an awkward pause, Trump returned to the topic he’d been asked about, telling reporters, “He’s asking me about surprise, and we did.”

 

“And because of that surprise, we knocked out ... we probably knocked out 50 percent ... and much more than we anticipated doing. So if I go and tell everybody about it, there’s no longer a surprise,” he said.

 

The surprise Pearl Harbor airstrike against the U.S. Pacific Fleet on Dec. 7, 1941 left more than 2,400 American service members dead and nearly 1,200 injured from bombs and shells that sunk four American battleships and left four more severely damaged. It was the deadliest attack on American soil until the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks on New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.

 

Seven of those ships were salvaged and returned to service, while the seventh — the U.S.S. Arizona — was left where it had settled just below the harbor’s surface after a Japanese bomb detonated inside a explosive powder magazine.

 

The attack took place after months of failed negotiations between Tokyo and Washington over economic sanctions imposed by the U.S., the U.K., China and The Netherlands in an attempt to deny Japan’s military the raw materials it needed to prosecute wars in China and what is now Vietnam.

 

Japan declared war on the U.S. on the day of the strikes, but the official declaration did not arrive in Washington until afterwards.

 

The Pearl Harbor attack gave Roosevelt the leverage he needed to push for the U.S. to formally enter World War II — allowing him to join ally Great Britain in fighting Adolf Hitler’s march through Europe — with the House and Senate approving declarations of war against Japan by margins of 388-1 and 82-0, respectively.

 

Less than four years later, Japan would accept America’s demand for “unconditional surrender” after the U.S. dropped the first two — and thus far the only two — nuclear weapons to be used in combat in separate strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

 

The Japanese government has never formally apologized for the infamous sneak attack, though one of Takaichi’s predecessors — the late Shinzo Abe — delivered a speech expressing "sincere and everlasting condolences" to the American and Japanese personnel killed in the fighting that day during a 2016 visit to the Pearl Harbor memorial above the wreck of Arizona.

 

Abe, who was assassinated in July 2022, said at the time that the U.S. and Japan “must never repeat the horrors of war again.”

17347: BHM 2026—The White House.

 

A Proclamation from the President of the United States of America takes the standard “Black History is American History” approach.

17286: Washing Your Hands Of Restroom Hygiene Inclusivity…?

 

Making restroom hygiene more inclusive? Given the collective anti-DEIBA+ sentiments, it sounds like something the White House—and White advertising agencies—would pooh-pooh.

17117: On The White House & White Advertising Agencies, Part 9.

Mythical Mad Men Character Don Draper declared, “If you don’t like what is being said, then change the conversation.”

 

The iconic statement reflects how the White House mirrors White advertising agencies.

 

Another Mad Man named Don—President Donald J. Trump—didn’t like what was being said, which included publicizing contentious cat fights with Elon Musk and accusations that the Commander-in-Chief appears in the infamous Jeffrey Epstein files.

 

So, Trump changed the conversation—by keeping the peace with modern-day Peacekeepers and bombing a bully to obliteration. And he even spouted a tagline: Peace Through Strength.

 

What’s next? Peace talks.

 

Let’s hope the conversations proceed peacefully. Otherwise, somebody’s gonna rest in peace.

 

Peace out.

 

17081: The Politics Of Black Bears & White Bears…?

 

Nature is Nonpartisan declares: The black bears of Tennessee don’t care who’s in the White House.

 

Okay, but they probably get less respect from the White House than polar bears in Alaska.

17033: On The White House & White Advertising Agencies, Part 8.

 

Advertising Icon David Ogilvy is attributed with saying, “Search the parks in all your cities; you’ll find no statues for committees.”

 

The quote may be applied to President Donald J. Trump meeting with his Cabinet—a spectacle that reflects most executive meetings at White advertising agencies and White holding companies.

 

The predominately White crew is comprised of anti-DEIBA+ disciples who really are DEI hires—whereby the acronym stands for Didn’t Earn It. 

 

Indeed, the collective represents extreme exclusivity, patented privilege, and classic cronyism, supplemented with spineless sycophants jockeying for political power.

 

A Confederacy of Dunces is the title this group has earned—although it’s debatable that these fools have ever earned anything.

 

Yep, the White House mirrors White advertising agencies.

16976: BHM 2025—On The White House & White Advertising Agencies, Part 7.

 

President Donald J. Trump’s antics continue to mirror Adland—right down to the handling of Black History Month.

 

Trump issued a proclamation (depicted above) recognizing February 2025 as National Black History Month. To date, he has not taken any intentional actions to honor the event. Indeed, Trump’s attacks on DEI arguably counter the official rhetoric.

 

This behavior is typical of White advertising agencies, where BHM enthusiasm is proclaimed, yet not demonstrated with deliberate initiative. There is no walk to justify and/or support the talk.

 

Trump and his sycophantic cronies position themselves as disruptors of the political status quo. The performative proclamations, however, perpetuate White supremacy and systemic racism—it’s all business as usual.

10038: Filmmakers Edited Out Of Contest…?

From The Los Angeles Times…

Filmmakers ‘appalled’ by process in White House video contest

Filmmakers whose work was among 11 finalists are upset that the White House has not explained how winners were chosen. They think their controversial topic may explain why they were left out.

By Paloma Esquivel, Los Angeles Times

Anida Yoeu Ali and Masahiro Sugano were excited when they heard about the White House video contest on issues affecting Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. They spent two weeks putting together a three-minute film on the plight of Cambodian deportees, then watched as online views outpaced the competition.

But they found out last month that they didn’t win, and since then have been unable to find out how the contest was decided. They, and one contest winner, think the film’s topic cut too close to a controversy over the record number of immigrants deported by the Obama administration.

“We’ve shown there’s a huge interest in this issue,” said Ali, a performance artist and 2010-11 U.S. Fulbright Fellow. “We’re just appalled that we’ve been completely dismissed in the process.”

White House staffers emphasized that the contest would be judged in part by viewers, but the vote count was never made public, and repeated requests by the filmmakers to learn more about what happened with the votes have not been answered.

Shin Inouye, a White House spokesman, declined to answer any questions about how winners were selected or how votes factored into that process, saying only that the entries are appreciated and that they were only able to invite a select group of winners to Washington.

“While some applicants are not selected, we thank them for their participation, continue to encourage them to speak out, and we look forward to working with them in the future,” he said.

Ali and Sugano, of Chicago, said they decided to make the video after meeting several young deportees in Cambodia while on Ali’s Fulbright fellowship.

“My Asian Americana” features young men and women wrapped in or flanked by the American flag, recounting memories about home, such as leaves changing color in New Hampshire, baseball games at Fenway Park and fireworks on the Fourth of July. Some were born in refugee camps and had never been to Cambodia before.

All of the deportees featured in the video were removed because they had criminal records. Many were deported years after serving their sentences, they said. The Obama administration sought to focus deportations on migrants with criminal records but has been criticized for casting a wide net. In recent months, administration officials announced efforts to ease deportations for those who meet certain criteria; the scope of those efforts is still unclear.

In the video, the deportees recite things they miss about the U.S.: Thanksgiving, apple pie, “my La-Z-Boy recliner,” “sitting there watching the game … with all the guys while my sisters and mom cook in the kitchen.”

“I am an exiled American, and I can’t go home,” they say.

The film, among more than 200 submitted, was picked as a finalist by a selection committee that included people with a background in film. After the finalists were announced, the White House said in a video on its website that viewers would help pick winners by watching the videos and voting. But which videos received the most votes was never made clear, Ali, Sugano and others who participated in the contest said.

Ali and Sugano kept track of YouTube hits to gauge the popularity of their video. Before the contest ended, “My Asian Americana” had 12,000 views, they said.

The pair received an e-mail in March, informing them and other finalists that the voting period had concluded and promising an assessment of the count by the following week, Ali and Sugano said. A few days later, they received a short e-mail informing them they had not won. Out of the 11 finalists, the makers of six videos were invited to the White House.

“That video was the most powerful. It was the most well done,” said Paul Kim, a comedian who was chosen as a winner for his video about an Asian American talent competition. “I guess it was just a controversial topic.”

The White House honored the winners earlier this month at an event called “Champions of Change,” one in a series of such events meant to honor people making a difference in their communities. Winners included Kim, a spoken word artist, organizers of a Philadelphia sports program, a teacher and her immigrant students, gay and lesbian outreach workers, and an illustrator.

Kim, who said his video made his family proud and drew attention to his work as a Los Angeles-based comedian, said he thinks Ali and Sugano should have been invited.

But, he said, he hoped critics would keep the video challenge in perspective.

“I don’t think people should take this contest too seriously,” he said. “The contest doesn’t even have to happen in the first place. They were trying to provide something to get more attention for Asian Americans.”

Ali and Sugano said they’re dismayed by the lack of transparency about the process.

“It’s the White House, and we find it very dishonorable for them to discount and just throw away the votes,” Sugano said. “The community came out and made it clear that this is the big issue, that deportation is an important issue, and they dismissed that.”

6859: House Music.

From The New York Times…

Music in the (White) House

By Rush & Molloy

White House social secretary Desirée Rogers is firing back at critics who think the Obamas are letting pop culture cheapen the presidential residence.

The administration took some heat when it recently let Mariah Carey’s husband, Nick Cannon, use the North Lawn to tout “America’s Got Talent.” But Rogers tells us, “The President wants the White House to be a stage.

“We want Americans feeling they’re part of the house,” the stylish Rogers told us at a gathering of the Creative Coalition this week.

The Obamas’ populism — and this woeful economy — explain why they’ve chosen to host fewer grand state dinners and more public events where children are invited.

“It’s great to see a performance there,” she said. “It is more than great when you’re also teaching.”

On Monday, Wynton Marsalis was there teaching jazz. On July 21, the subject will be country music.

The Obamas dig country?

“They like all kinds of music,” said Rogers, who promised classical and Latin will follow.

And, since the White House screening room has only 42 seats, she said, “We might have a big screen on the lawn.”

Rogers, who schmoozed with a Coalition crowd that included Dana Delany, Tim Daly, Rocco Landesman and designer Nanette Lepore, said she was told the black-tie crowd at state dinners would never dance.

“So we got Earth, Wind and Fire,” said Rogers, the first African-American to hold the job. “And by the end, they were doing a conga line.”