Clearly, the Trump administration loves to communicate with memes. The last example, yesterday, Monday, October 27. As The Verge reported, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is taking advantage of the news with Halothe cult science fiction franchise that will arrive in 2026 on PlayStation 5.
In the post we can see characters from the franchise and a Warthog vehicle from the game, and this comment: “Destroy the flood. Join.Ice.Gov.” Two phrases that will be translated separately. The first, first of all, offers two levels of reading that are difficult to translate into French due to a double meaning that does not exist in our language. We can thus write: “Steal the tidal wave”, since in English “flood” designates a flood, referring here to the supposed incessant migratory flow towards the United States. But, in the context of Halo, the “flood” is also a parasite that can contaminate units and, by extension, corrupt them. Then we will translate “Destroy the parasites”. Quite a program, that of Donald Trump’s campaign.
The second part of the message is more easily translated. “Join ICE (the US immigration police, editor’s note).” In the caption, DHS does not forget to add a link to the ICE recruitment site, specifying that it is necessary to “end this fight.”
ICE’s goal is clear: attract the attention of a young audience to encourage them to apply… while continuing to dehumanize undocumented immigrants. In fact, the publication implicitly compares migrants to floods. The image was viewed more than 14 million times in less than 24 hours.
Meme exchanges about “Halo”
This meme follows a lengthy social media exchange between the Trump administration and video game distributor GameStop. It all started with the announcement of the remake of the first Halo work: Evolved campaign which, for the first time, will not only come out on Xbox, but also on PS5. A historic first for the franchise.
Seizing the opportunity, GameStop released a parody statement to declare that “the console war is officially over.” The profile also took the opportunity to share a photo of Donald Trump shaking hands with the Master Chief, the hero of the license, citing a tweet that humorously states that the Republican has put an end to “the 20-year console war.”
The White House then published an image of the American president dressed in the hero’s armor. For its part, GameStop responded with its own Trump version of Master Chief, adding a meme version of Vice President JD Vance’s head, replaced by what appears to be the anthropomorphic AI Cortana.
This isn’t the first time the US Department of Homeland Security has relied on a video game meme. In September, the US government shared a video that combined the slogan of Pokémon “Catch ’em all” in his campaign to deport illegal immigrants.
The publication showed armed police and customs agents handcuffing people presented as illegal immigrants, to the famous theme song of Pokémon. Here, too, migrants were compared to creatures. The Japanese franchise has firmly denied any involvement in this video.
Source: BFM TV
