Former President Donald Trump on Sunday joked that one of his most devoted fans would rather kill himself than see President Joe Biden win re-election—drawing a wave of left-wing comparisons to cult leader Jim Jones.
“This is front row Joe,” Trump said of one rally attendee in Las Vegas. “He’s at every one, this guy.”
Trump then joked it would be “incredible” if the frequent attendee wound up voting for Biden in November, adding: “I don’t think so… It would be suicide before Biden, right?”
Trump’s seemingly sarcastic comment has roiled social media, with critics blasting the Trump camp as cultish and likening him to Jones, infamous for leading his cult followers in a mass suicide in Jonestown, Guyana.
“We’ve entered the Jim Jones endgame. Beware the Flavor-aid,” commented one user on X.
“And at long last, he literally becomes Orange Jim Jones,” responded another critic.
“Strong Jim Jones vibe here from the presumptive Republican nominee for President,” wrote someone else.
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) similarly quipped: “Not a cult.”
“Come for the heatstroke, stay for the suicide pact,” joked someone else, referencing the six rallygoers who were taken to a hospital and the two dozen others who received medical attention on-site amid scorching heat that topped 100 degrees.
Other Trump critics shared Kool-Aid memes and GIFs, with some going so far as to revive a 2016-era digitally altered image of Trump’s face superimposed on a well-known image of Jones.
Jones, infamously, convinced over 900 of his supporters to commit mass suicide in the 1970s by drinking poison inside a Kool-Aid-style beverage.
“Drink up, y’all,” one person wrote along with a GIF of the Kool-Aid Man.
But not every critic is fully onboard with the Trump-Jones comparisons.
“I object to these comparisons of Donald Trump to Jim Jones,” quipped one user. “Donald Trump would never offer his followers a free beverage.”
Responded someone else: “He’d turn it into his final grift. Only $17 a glass.”
Trump’s suicide joke was not the only indication on Sunday that he doesn’t care about his supporters—he said so himself.
“I don’t care about you, I just want your vote,” he said during the speech.
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