Obamna

About

Obamna is a mispronunciation of the name 'Obama' made by Donald Trump during a presidential rally in October of 2018. The mispronunciation was featured in The Daily Show's "Trump's Best Word" competition, and was the subject of jokes, primarily on YouTube and TikTok, in 2020. The meme has frequently been combined with a clip of Joe Biden edited to appear as if he is shouting 'Soda!'

Origin

Prior to Donald Trump's mispronounciation, the word obamna has appeared online as a way to intentionally misspell Barack Obama's name, often in the context of ironic memes made about the former president. For example, on August 24th, 2018, Reddit user ieatjamsauce posted a photo to /r/okbuddyretard^[1] titled, "It's brock obamna!" along with a meme featuring Obama (shown below). A post to /r/okbuddyretard^[2] from October 18th also uses the misspelling "obamna," predating Trump's use of the word by only 4 days.

On October 22nd, 2018, President Donald Trump held a political rally in Houston, Texas.^[3] At about 43 minutes into the speech, Trump begins talking about the second amendment. At the 43:33 mark, Trump mispronounces "Obama" as "Obamna," possibly mixing the former president's name with the word "amnesty," which he says after the mispronunciation (shown below).

Spread

On March 2nd, 2020, an unlisted video of Trump saying "obamna" was uploaded to The Daily Show's official YouTube channel.^[6] On March 10th, The Daily Show posted a compilation of Donald Trump mispronouncing and making up words to their Facebook page,^[4] announcing that they would be holding a "Best Trump Word" bracket (shown below). Obamna was one of the options. Viewers could visit the Comedy Central website^[5] and vote week-by-week for their favorite Trump word. The obamna mispronunciation was voted out in round 2 of the bracket.

On November 23rd, "obamna" was defined on Urban Dictionary^[14] by Cockroach Glue 81 as, "obamna is obamas true power. it was awakened when Donald trump pronounced Obama as obamna and made him mad." The definition gained 15 thumbs ups in 2 weeks.

Obamna / Soda!

On November 14th, LitRandomness reuploaded the isolated clip to YouTube,^[7] garnering over 32,000 views in under a month. On November 20th the same user uploaded a video of Joe Biden to YouTube^[8] where it appears he's saying "soda" by cutting off the end of the word "Minnesota" during a Super Tuesday speech.^[9] On the same day, kalebfurst uploaded a video to TikTok^[10] featuring the on-screen caption "No matter your beliefs, I found something we can all agree on" followed by a clip of Trump saying "obamna" and Biden saying "soda," garnering over 2.9 million views in 3 weeks (shown below, left). On November 24th, nick.salvagno uploaded a video to TikTok^[11] with the on-screen caption, "best quotes from each presidential candidate 'very inspirational'" followed by the two videos, garnering over 1.1 million views in 2 weeks (shown below, right). Users continued to use the sound and clips in similar videos, often ironically hyping the quotes up as inspirational or controversial.

Another related trend sees two TikTokers change their bios, one to "obamna" and one to "soda," and showing off the bios in a video (examples shown below, left).^[12] Other TikTokers used the audio for more ironic memes (example shown below, right).^[13]

As of December 9th, 2020, kalebfurst's original sound has been used in over 1,400 videos on TikTok. Videos using the hashtag #obamna have been viewed over 5.4 million times.

Related Memes

Joe Biden "Soda!"

Joe Biden 'SODA!' refers to a clip of the United States President Joe Biden shouting "Minnesota!" at a rally, cut in a way that Biden appears to be shouting "Soda!" as the crowd proceeds to cheer. Often paired with the Obamna video, the clip has been a subject of memes and references since 2020.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References