Unpresidented

On 17 December 2016, Donald Trump tweeted:

A few hours later, he tweeted:

China steals United States Navy research drone in international waters – rips it out of water and takes it to China in unprecedented act.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 17, 2016

This tweet remains up.

Visual responses to original tweet

Memetic origins

In December 2016, president-elect Donald Trump tweeted about China’s seizure of a U.S. Navy drone, calling it an “unpresidented act.” The tweet was deleted and reposted with the correct spelling, but screenshots circulated widely. Media outlets, social media users, and Merriam-Webster highlighted the error, and the term quickly became a meme.

Good morning! The #WordOfTheDay is…not 'unpresidented'. We don't enter that word. That's a new one. https://t.co/BJ45AtMNu4

— Merriam-Webster (@MerriamWebster) December 17, 2016

The word persisted as a shorthand used in commentary to describe moments seen as breaking presidential norms during Trump’s political rise and presidency. Its continued cultural use was formalized in 2024 with the publication of Martha Brockenbrough’s biography Unpresidented, which adopted the term as a title referencing its memetic and symbolic significance.

Sources: Snopes

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