The nation’s capital shouldn’t have an agenda. But we all know where they stand.
And now Washington, D.C. rushed to cover-up this illegal targeting of conservatives.
Washington, DC’s District Department of Transportation (DDOT) strongly condemned a provocative transit ad near the Capitol that compared MAGA hat wearers to trash.
“Keep DC trash free,” read the inflammatory ad, which was brought to public attention by Capitol Hill Baptist Church pastor Caleb Morell.
The ad depicted a red circle with a line through it over an image of a person wearing a MAGA hat and holding a book titled Project 2025.
At the bottom, the ad bore logos for the District of Columbia Department of Public Works and the Mayor’s Office of the Clean City program.
DDOT swiftly disavowed any connection to the politically charged imagery.
“This image was not created, funded, or authorized by the DC government, and our teams are currently working to remove them,” the department posted on X in response to Morell’s discovery. “If you see additional images like this, we encourage you to report them to 311.”
When reached for comment, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser’s office directed inquiries to DDOT’s official statement.
The origins of the ad remain unknown, but this incident is not the first time a U.S. city has been embroiled in controversy over misleading political advertisements.
Last fall, for example, the Instagram artist @winstontseng admitted to creating fake ads that falsely suggested the NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris.
The ads, which depicted Harris in team-branded attire, mysteriously appeared near bus stops in Philadelphia during the 2024 election season.
The controversy over political messaging hit another flashpoint during the final stretch of the 2024 election when President Biden faced sharp criticism for remarks seemingly targeting supporters of President-elect Donald Trump.
“The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters. His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable and it’s un-American,” Biden said during an October webcast with advocacy group Voto Latino, reacting to a comment by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe.
Hinchcliffe had joked that a U.S. territory was “a floating island of garbage” during his warm-up set at Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden.
Biden’s comments sparked immediate backlash. The White House scrambled to downplay the remarks, claiming Biden said “supporter’s” with an apostrophe, despite video evidence showing him clearly emphasizing the plural term.
The attempt at damage control even drew criticism from the White House stenographer, who oversees official transcripts. Biden’s team insisted that the president was referencing Hinchcliffe’s rhetoric, not Trump’s supporters as a whole.
Trump, ever quick to capitalize on the moment, responded with a tongue-in-cheek photo of himself donning an orange vest and climbing into a garbage truck, taking a jab at Biden’s words.
The debacle over DC’s MAGA-themed transit ad now joins a growing list of politically charged controversies that highlight the increasingly blurred lines between political art, guerrilla messaging, and official discourse in America’s polarized landscape.
Stay tuned to Prudent Politics.
