Trump Fails to Enlist Coke in His Epstein Distraction

Photo: Lynne Sladky/AP Photo

Donald Trump really wants the spiraling Jeffrey Epstein files debacle to go away. Yet for once, MAGA supporters aren’t coming to his aid. In fact, it’s Trump’s “‘boys’ and, in some cases, ‘gals’” who are driving the scandal over his administration’s failure to release more materials on the late sex offender. Despite the president’s efforts to mock and berate his followers into submission, they stubbornly refuse to drop the conspiracy theory he spent years encouraging them to believe.

So in a moment of desperation, Trump turned to the one thing that’s always there for him: Coke. He announced in a Truth Social post on Wednesday afternoon that Coca-Cola will be switching to “REAL Cane Sugar in Coke in the United States,” all thanks to him:

Is it possible that Trump was just so excited about forthcoming Coke products that he couldn’t wait to share the good news? Sure. But his random announcement seemed to many like an effort to push Epstein out of the news by revealing a big and controversial change to a classic American product.

Unfortunately for Trump, Coca-Cola wasn’t willing to play along.

Coca-Cola Company initially responded with a noncommittal statement that praised Trump’s “enthusiasm.” But the company did not confirm or deny his claim that American Coca-Cola will soon be made with cane sugar, like Mexican Coke, rather than corn syrup.

And within hours, Coca-Cola was sharing a statement defending its use of corn syrup after Fox News framed the alleged switch to cane sugar as a win for the “MAHA” movement in an X post. (Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has called high-fructose corn syrup “just a formula for making you obese and diabetic,” sparking rumors that he might ban or restrict it from certain foods.)

Coca-Cola responded to the post by insisting that high-fructose corn syrup is just a “sweetener made from corn,” saying that it’s totally “safe”:

And corn-syrup producers put out a statement saying the switch to cane sugar would actually run counter to Trump’s agenda.

“Replacing high fructose corn syrup with cane sugar doesn’t make sense,” said Corn Refiners Association president and CEO John Bode. “President Trump stands for American manufacturing jobs, American farmers, and reducing the trade deficit. Replacing high fructose corn syrup with cane sugar would cost thousands of American food manufacturing jobs, depress farm income, and boost imports of foreign sugar, all with no nutritional benefit.”

So if Trump’s Coke tweet was meant as a distraction from the Epstein files, he’s now botched that too. Coca-Cola is scrambling to put out PR fires and American farmers are ticked off, but these new controversies aren’t big enough to shift the national conversation away from the disgraced financier.

And the American public doesn’t seem all that stoked for Trump’s new “New Coke.” Fans of “MexiCoke” tell the New York Times that they doubt its exact flavor could be replicated on a large scale in America. Trump may say it’s “better,” but what does the world’s foremost consumer of Diet Coke really know about the flavor of regular Coke anyway?