Politics

The Brilliant Point in George Lopez' Trump Parody That Nobody's Discussing

September 11th 2015

A satirical Funny or Die video featuring actor and comedian George Lopez as "Donaldo Trumpez," a fictional businessman who wants to be Mexico's next president, has gone viral, and it packs a loaded, comedic punch. Like his American Doppelganger, Republican presidential primary candidate Donald Trump, Trumpez is dead set on building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border in an effort to "keep out the Americans who are coming here and ruining Mexico."


Borrowing from the anti-immigrant rhetoric of Trump, Trumpez tells a fake, Univision journalist that he plans to "make Mexico great again," and part of that plan involves imposing policies that would limit the number of Americans who enter the country. The irony of this perspective is not lost on American viewers for whom this political sentiment is all too familiar. Lopez's character delivers biting criticism—masked by humor—of the social double standard that has developed between the U.S. and Mexico.

"But the Americans have been our allies for a long time," the fake reporter says.

"Let me tell you something," Trumpez responds in Spanish. "When the United States sends their people, they're not sending their best. They're sending people with lots of problems. They only come to Mexico to watch a show with a donkey and watch women lift up their tops. Mexico is more than that!" 

The argument that illegal immigrants from Mexico are dangerous drug traffickers and sexual predators has been a defining feature of Trump's anti-immigrant platform, serving as the foundation for his proposal to build a Great Wall of China-inspired wall along the border. Likewise, Trumpez suggests that Americans visiting Mexico do not positively contribute to the country, and in fact, do more harm than good.

There is some truth to that notion, too. Just as there is some truth to Trump's suggestion that there are people crossing the border who have smuggled drugs, for example, but both characters fail to recognize that their positions involve gross generalizations about the people on the other side. Still, whereas many Mexican immigrants cross the border in hopes of securing better lives for their families, Americans tend to see Mexico as a place to party—somewhere they can go to have fun, raise hell, and come back home when they're finished.

A 2013 Pew poll found that 56 percent of Mexicans also blamed both America and their own country for drug violence in Mexico, and about one-fifth of those surveyed said that they considered the U.S. solely responsible. And as far as perceptions about the U.S. in Mexico goes, this tends to be the image most commonly attributed to American tourists:

"But what about the Americans who come here with their families, or the Americans who don't get drunk or do cocaine?" the interviewer asks.

Indeed, misperceptions about one another's countries has strained relations between our neighboring countries. Lopez makes that point perfectly clear in his spot on impression of Trump.

"The people who come here to Mexico—the Americans—are rapists," Trumpez says bluntly and offensively, echoing similar statements by Trump. "Every year, America sends their damn drunks—their frat boys to Cabo, to Cancun. They come here for their Spring Breaks to get drunk and to rape each other. It's disgusting!"

Related:
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