CNN’s Harry Enten Sets Fire To Trump ‘Gulf Of America’ Rebranding: ‘Has Gone Horribly!’
CNN senior data correspondent Harry Enten hammered President Donald Trump’s effort to rebrand the Gulf of Mexico to “The Gulf of America” by ticking through brutal stats on the campaign’s effectiveness.
Trump signed an executive order on Inauguration Day changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and fought a losing battle to coerce the Associated Press into complying with the change.
This week, Republicans in Congress took the rebranding a step further by passing a bill to codify the naming and require federal agencies to update all documents within 180 days:
SEC. 2. Renaming of Gulf of Mexico as “Gulf of America”.
(a) Renaming.—The Gulf of Mexico shall be known as the “Gulf of America”.
(b) References.—Any reference in a law, map, regulation, document, paper, or other record of the United States to the Gulf of Mexico shall be deemed to be a reference to the “Gulf of America”.
(c) Implementation.—
(1) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary of the Interior, acting through the Chairman of the Board on Geographic Names, shall oversee the implementation of the renaming described in subsection (a) with respect to each Federal document and map.
(2) REQUIREMENT.—Not later than 180 days after the date of the enactment of this section, the head of each Federal agency shall update each document and map of the Federal agency in accordance with the renaming described in subsection (a).
On Friday’s edition of CNN News Central, Enten joined co-anchor John Berman to assess the renaming’s penetration with the public in the months since Trump signed the order. The verdict — based on search data and public polling by the likes of Fox News — was that “this has gone horribly!”:
JOHN BERMAN: How’s this whole Gulf of America launch going? Since the president started, how much has it seeped into the consciousness?
HARRY ENTEN: Let’s just put it this way. It has bounced. It’s like I’m wearing waterproof clothing. If the water was coming down on me and it was Gulf of America, it bounces right off of me. It has gone horribly!
This bounce is terrible. Take a look here. Has more Google searches since Trump’s proclamation three months ago on February 9th. It is a ’72 Dolphins blowout!
Gulf of Mexico has been more searched in 50 states — that is all of them — versus the Gulf of America. Zero states. None of them.
Plus I should point out the District of Columbia has more searches for the Gulf of Mexico.
So the bottom line is, despite whatever Trump wants to say at this particular point, when it comes to what Americans are actually using, they are sticking with the old name. They are sticking the Gulf with Mexico.
They are not, in any state, going with the Gulf of America. It is 50-t- none, a blowout in favor of the Gulf of Mexico over the Gulf of America.
JOHN BERMAN: So when you’re going into Google to search for whatever that body of water is called underneath, you know, Alabama, Mississippi and by Florida there, people in every state are typing in this instead of this.
HARRY ENTEN: Exactly right. In every single state, more folks are typing Gulf of Mexico in order to search for that body of water underneath our southern border compared to the Gulf of America, zero states.
JOHN BERMAN: All right. That’s Google searches. What about the polling?
HARRY ENTEN: So what about the polling? Because sometimes people might be searching for the poll or you know, searching on Google, but that doesn’t necessarily implicate what they actually feel about the issue. On this particular one, it does. It does. It very much lines up.
Rename the Gulf Of Mexico to Gulf of America. Look at this. 67% of registered voters in the United States, according to a March Fox News poll, say that they oppose renaming the Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America. Just 31% of Americans favor, and I should note, even 36% of Republicans oppose it, despite the fact that there was near uniformity when, in fact, the House GOP lined up behind the change of Gulf of Mexican to Gulf America, but when it comes to the American people, two-thirds oppose and that is very rare because in our politics you rarely get two-thirds of Americans to agree upon anything. But they do oppose the idea of renaming the Gulf Of Mexico to Gulf of America.
Watch above via CNN News Central.
