The exploits and antics of Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump haven’t always traveled well internationally, certainly not for Mexicans, many of whom burned home the point on Easter Sunday.
Trump has taken center stage in this year’s Holy Week effigy incinerations. “Trump effigies burned across Mexico, from Puebla to Mexico’s industrial hub Monterrey,” Reuters reported, citing other media reports.
Burning figures in effigy is a Holy Week tradition in Mexico, an incendiary ritual in which residents of neighborhoods put to the flames figures from real life intended to represent Judas Iscariot, the betrayer of Jesus Christ. Anthropologists, Reuters reported, believe the practice “serves a symbolic function to overcome divisions and unite communities around a
Trump won himself no friends in Mexico for his recent calls to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, or for campaign-trail statements that vilified Mexicans across the board. “They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us,” he said of Mexicans at a campaign kickoff event last June. “They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
And so, Trump’s become at least briefly popular in Mexico, but not like he may have expected. “Since he started his campaign and began talking about immigrants, Mexico, and Mexicans, I said ‘I’ve got to get this guy,’” said artist Felipe Linares, who created his own Trump effigy — taking a break from 50 years of making Judases for the Holy Week ritual.