The Greatest Crowd in the History of Crowds
How Trump’s pathological obsession with size is connected to the length of his tie.
Let’s get something straight right off the bat: nobody, absolutely nobody, loves crowds more than Donald Trump. Forget elections or international diplomacy—no, those are mere side quests. The real business of a Trump rally is counting the masses, inflating the numbers, and then doubling them again for good measure. For a man who doesn’t read, he sure does love numbers.
It’s an obsession that’s long been documented, from the now-infamous inaugural crowd size dispute—where the White House press secretary was forced to make the ludicrous claim that Trump’s inauguration crowd was the “largest in history”—to every subsequent rally in every obscure corner of America. There’s a deep, primal need for Trump to have the biggest crowd, and by “biggest,” we mean a crowd so immense it defies the laws of physics, like trying to stuff the entire state of Texas into a Costco parking lot.
But Trump’s obsession with crowd sizes is not just a quirk. It’s a religion. There’s no end to the sermon about the throngs of people who flock to bask in the glow of his orange-hued aura. This, after all, is a man who famously told his supporters during the 2016 campaign: “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” A bold claim, yes, but also an astounding one when you consider that the image of a bullet-riddled bystander doesn’t even phase his followers, who are more focused on ensuring that they, too, are part of the *biggest* crowd Fifth Avenue has ever seen.
The longer his tie, the bigger his lie.
The moment Trump steps onto that stage—be it in Tulsa or some forgotten middle-of-nowhere cornfield in Iowa—his internal calculator starts whirring. “Thousands and thousands,” he’ll say, waving a hand vaguely over the crowd as if there’s a sea of humanity stretching all the way to the horizon. Never mind that the press photos might show some gaps big enough to hold a few NFL stadiums. Trump has already decided: this is *the* event. The biggest. Historic. Tremendous. A crowd so immense that you’ll be talking about it for generations, passing the tale down to your grandchildren as if it were Woodstock. Just... with fewer good vibes and a lot more red hats.
Of course, his need to out-crowd himself comes at a cost. Poor aides must scramble to find venues, sometimes squeezing into undersized airport hangars or oversized fields, because Trump’s rallies aren’t about convenience—they’re about mythology. These venues become his Colosseum, the rallygoers his adoring gladiators, and above it all, he stands like some orange-crowned Caesar demanding we measure his greatness not by trivial matters like political achievements but by the simple headcount of who showed up. If a venue can only hold 10,000 people? Fear not. For in the great numerical fantasy land of Trump’s mind, that venue will always have 50,000, no, make it 100,000. And throw in a few more zeros for good luck.
And therein lies the genius (or madness) of it all. Trump knows the true key to immortality isn’t policy or public service—it’s spectacle. Why fret over something as tedious as a COVID response or foreign policy when you can conjure an army of adoring fans with a wave of your hand? So what if those fans don’t really exist, or if they happened to be home watching reruns of *The Apprentice* instead of standing in a packed arena? Numbers are elastic in Trumpworld. Who’s to say what reality even is anymore?
As he looks out over his not-so-gargantuan sea of supporters, you can almost imagine Trump envisioning them as stars in the night sky: countless, unquantifiable, and twinkling just for him. And even if reality—pesky, tedious reality—says otherwise, the legend of Trump's never-ending crowds will continue to grow. Every rally will be the biggest, most “unbelievable” turnout ever seen. And in the end, that’s all that really matters: the illusion of size, the fantasy of grandeur.
And who are we to argue with that? After all, he’s only measuring his worth the way we all do in the digital age—by metrics, likes, and retweets. Except, instead of Instagram followers, he’s counting flesh-and-blood bodies, and instead of “influencer,” he prefers the title of “the most tremendous crowd magnet of all time.” So let the numbers roll in. Let the spreadsheets overflow with imaginary masses. Because if there’s one thing Trump has made crystal clear, it’s this: a crowd, like truth, is whatever you want it to be.
And Trump’s obsession with size doesn’t stop at the magnitude of his crowds—it extends right down to the very length of his tie. The longer, the better, in true Trumpian fashion. Much like his rallies and crowd estimates, his ties are another symbol of overcompensation, designed to stretch the truth as far as the fabric will allow. The classic Trump tie, notoriously long and often dangling well past his belt line, is more than just a questionable fashion choice; it’s a statement. In Trump’s world, bigger is always better, and what better way to signal that than with a tie that seems to defy traditional proportions?
In many ways, the tie acts as a metaphor for his entire persona: an outward symbol of excess, of never settling for anything less than the most. It’s no secret that Trump views life through a lens of grandiosity, and his tie reflects that same ethos. Where other men would wear a tie to complement an outfit, Trump’s tie practically demands to be the centerpiece, a beacon of his philosophy of bigger, louder, and longer. Just as his speeches and claims stretch reality, his ties stretch down his torso, creating a physical manifestation of his fixation on size.
But the tie’s length also speaks to a deeper insecurity, much like his endless boasts about the number of people who attend his rallies. It’s as if the tie, like the crowds, must be longer, must exceed expectations, because anything less would signal weakness, a chink in the armor of his image. The length of his tie mirrors the inflation of his crowd numbers—a visual reinforcement of the idea that Trump needs to be seen as larger-than-life, towering above any and all competition.
At the core of it, Trump’s obsession with size, whether in crowds or ties, serves the same purpose: it’s about power, control, and projecting an image of dominance. He can’t afford to be average, so everything—every number, every piece of clothing—must be exaggerated, elongated, made to feel more significant than it really is. Just like the packed arenas he imagines, Trump’s extra-long ties are part of the spectacle, an extension of the myth that bigger always means better.