Trump hints at renaming New Mexico “New America”

Donald Trump has floated the possibility of renaming New Mexico “New America,” at least in a map posted on his social network, Truth.

The US president shared an image of the state with the second word crossed out and “America” written in red. The post did not make clear whether it was one of his Sunday afternoon jokes or a provocation pointing to a decision still to come. That question gained weight because Trump signed a decree at the end of August ordering Lake Ontario, whose waters touch the United States and Canada, to be renamed Lake America.

The New Mexico post appeared among a string of unusual Truth messages. One showed Trump riding alongside George Washington in an image altered with artificial intelligence. Another placed the first US president with Trump in the Oval Office. Trump also shared an image of a soldier from a nonexistent military body called the American Space Force, apparently imagined for the conquest and patrol of outer space.

Perhaps the most extravagant image showed Iran's map reshaped into the outline of Trump's head, like an ex libris embedded in a map of the Middle East. The article places the posts within Trump's continuing enthusiasm for changing the names of geographic features, bodies of water, military aircraft programs, airports, institutions and cultural centers in Washington.

That campaign began early with the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America. In the hypothetical change suggested on Sunday, Trump again ignored grammatical agreement: the map read “Nuevo America.” The official White House account reposted the image with wide-eyed emojis, a familiar way for the administration to signal importance while treating the leader's antics with amusement and accusing critics of taking both themselves and his words too seriously.