Donald Trump is encouraging his supporters to carry a plastic card demonstrating their backing for him, including one design bearing an eagle, likened by critics to Nazi imagery.
Registered supporters were sent an email yesterday with four designs to choose from, although it was not immediately clear what benefits the cards would bring to their holders.
One of the deep red cards featured a gold eagle looking to its left, which was reminiscent of the Nazi Parteiadler, or party eagle.
The Trump campaign said the “official Trump cards” were for “President Trump’s strongest supporters” and that he had asked his fans for their advice on the designs.
“We recently met with the president in his Florida office and showed him four designs,” the email read. “Originally we were planning on releasing just one design, but when President Trump saw the cards on his desk, he said, ‘These are beautiful. We should let the American people decide — they always know best!’”
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Supporters voting for their favourite design are redirected to a fundraising page asking for a contribution of between $50 and $5,000 and stating: “President Trump wants to see your name at the top of the donor list.”
It was recently announced that Trump, 75, who has not said whether he will run in 2024, had amassed a war chest of $102 million from donations.
Steve Schmidt, a Republican public affairs strategist and Trump critic who worked on campaigns for George W Bush, tweeted: “Trump has commissioned a Party card resplendent with his very own Parteiadler. Terrific news. One thing to note is Trump’s fascist party eagle faces opposite the American Eagle which faces away from the arrows in her left talons and towards the olive branches symbolizing peace.”
Jenna Ellis, a lawyer who has helped to bring court cases against last year’s election result, tweeted: “To all the leftists triggered by the Trump Card: Imagine you were forced to carry one and show it to enter businesses and restaurants and fly. Vaccine Passports are 1000% worse.”
