If Trump Derangement Syndrome is real, I have a terminal case. Since 2015, I’ve written approximately 1000 news articles about Donald Trump‘s actions, words, beliefs, and (very occasionally) his odor.
That level of exposure to Trump can’t be healthy, but transcribing so many of his rambling speeches at least gives me a decent idea of what he’s trying to say, even if what he’s actually saying is an almost impenetrable word salad. But even I’m stumped at what he was trying to communicate during this speech to mark Mother’s Day.
When discussing drug smuggling into the United States by boat, Trump clearly thought it was important to give the following clarification:
Trump: Drugs coming by sea, by ocean, by water. A lot of people say, What do you mean by sea? Is it see? Like vision? No, it’s sea. SEA. pic.twitter.com/LJ9Q8CnUBC
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) May 12, 2026
“Drug traffic coming into our country is way down. And by sea. By sea. By ocean. By… the water y’know… A lot of people say “what do you mean by sea?” Is it “see”, like vision? No, it’s sea. S-E-A. But uh, it’s down 97%.”
I guess I’m going to have to twist my brain into a pretzel to wring even the slightest bit of sense out of this. Given that only a moron could get confused between drug smuggling “by sea” and “by see” (which doesn’t make any sense unless maybe if the Pope is doing it?) I’m going to assume that this is something Trump himself was personally corrected on.
Twisted brainwrongs
Trump has a long history of being confused on things like this, for example, his apparent belief that stealth technology literally makes fighter jets invisible to the naked eye. So, my best guess is that during a briefing, Trump was told about drug trafficking “by sea” and openly pondered that if everyone can “see” them doing it, why is nobody stopping them?
Doubtless, everyone in the Oval Office side-eyed each other for a moment and paused, silently hoping they’d all collectively imagined the most powerful man in the world asking this bizarre question. But no, they had to quickly explain that “by sea” means travelling over the ocean. Y’know, the big blue wet thing that’s right next to the beach.
Or maybe not! Who can really say what’s going on in the rat’s nest that is Trump’s brain? Maybe this is simply the result of two random and lonely neurons sparking against one another, resulting in this surreal gibberish.
Trump making absolutely no sense whatsoever, is happening more and more these days. He has a full physical evaluation coming up soon, so here’s hoping doctors soberly and calmly figure out exactly what’s up with him.
Published: May 12, 2026 07:33 am