The MAGA box campaign logo has never been more popular
Plus: How kids became our nation’s top “I Voted” sticker designers
Hello, in this issue we’ll look at the rise of the Trump-style “MAGA Box” logo and what makes the best “I Voted” stickers.
Scroll to the end to see: what Democrats are doing to make the most of the final leg of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. 🎤
The MAGA box campaign logo has never been more popular
Former President Donald Trump has left an indelible mark on Republican politics, policy, and rhetoric. But also campaign logo design. More Republican candidates than ever are running with Trump-style “MAGA Box” logos this year.
Trump’s presidential campaign logo has been tweaked slightly since he first announced his campaign in 2015, including the names of two different running mates after his first running mate refused to overturn the 2020 election. Still, the basic style has remained the same: Trump’s last name is set inside a box broken at the top by five stars. Ever since, the “MAGA Box” has become a popular template for other Republican candidate logos.
A review of every available campaign website and social media account of Republican U.S. House and Senate candidates running this year found 28 candidates use some version of the MAGA Box.
That’s up from 26 in 2022, 17 in 2020, and five in 2018, according to a eview of Republican logos going back to 2018 from the Center for American Politics and Design database. Trump’s campaign started a trend and it’s only grown more popular since.
Some, like the logo for Addison McDowell, a North Carolina Republican who proudly touts Trump’s endorsement on his website, look like an overt homage to Trump’s campaign logo. Others, such as the logo for Nella Domenici, a New Mexico U.S. Senate candidate, may barely seem to qualify. Michelle Talkington, a Maryland Republican, tops her MAGA Box not with stars, but a wall built of blocks.
Some candidates use a MAGA Box-style design to visually signify their allegiance to Trump. Is there really any question why Rep. Majorie Taylor-Greene (R-Ga.), for example, has the logo that she does? In contrast, Rep. Young Kim (R-Calif.), a Republican who won a district President Joe Biden carried in 2020, was named the most bipartisan California elected official and wouldn’t qualify as Ultra MAGA.
Kim’s logo, which uses a blue and gold MAGA Box with stars and everything, is less a sign that she’s Trump aligned than it is an acknowledgment that the MAGA Box is part of our visual political vernacular. It’s by now a generic design style that says “political logo,” and even some Democratic logos might qualify as iterations on a trend, like Sen. John Letterman (D-Pa.) and former Housing Secretary Julián Castro. Design trends that start as partisan often cross the aisle.
The MAGA Box can be taken on and off, and sometimes it seems logos speak louder than words. One of the new candidates this election cycle to use it is Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), the Trump-aligned No. 3 House Republican whose campaign added a box with stars around her preexisting flag-style E logo. Meanwhile Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), who once worked with former President George W. Bush, dropped the sides of his MAGA Box logo but kept the cattle, oil, and cotton icons on the top to show his last name between two parallel horizontal lines.
The most interesting campaign to drop its MAGA Box — even if only in a handful of recent fundraising emails — is Trump’s. Like Vice President Kamala Harris’ wordmark logo, Trump’s latest secondary logo is all text. After nearly a decade of MAGA Box, it looks naked without it and might take a little getting used to.
Political design trends are always changing, and just as Trump’s campaign has borrowed elements from Democratic former President Barack Obama’s campaign brand, like his Shepard Fairey-designed “Hope” poster, there’s a future where voters wouldn’t necessarily associate the MAGA Box style of campaign logo with Trumpism, but rather the look of politics in the late 2010s and early 2020s. Even Trump’s campaign is testing out a brand without it.
How kids became our nation’s top “I Voted” sticker designers
