President Donald Trump has renewed his call for New Mexico to be renamed, writing on Truth Social that the state should “immediately” adopt the name “New America.”
Trump said the change would reflect the state’s identity, arguing, “We are not Mexico, we are the United States of America!”
He also claimed that the proposed name could deliver economic and cultural benefits, saying home values and incomes would increase while boosting patriotic sentiment among residents.
Trump tied the proposal to his wider allegations about election integrity, suggesting that the “Crooked Elections” for which he says New Mexico is known might become honest under the new name.
The latest comments follow a post Trump shared last month featuring an AI-altered meme depicting New Mexico under a different name.
The proposal fits with Trump’s other attempts to relabel geographic landmarks, including his suggestions to call Lake Ontario the Lake of America and the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. In the meme, New Mexico was renamed “New America.”
The image showed a map of the state with the word “Mexico” crossed out in red and replaced by “America.”
About an hour later, the 80-year-old president shared an AI-generated video showing him placing a new “America” label over a “Welcome to New Mexico” highway sign before performing his familiar double-fist dance.
President Donald Trump has again called for New Mexico to be rebranded, writing on Truth Social that it should be renamed “New America.”
The Republican posted the image on social media without a caption, prompting an angry reaction from his political opponents.
After apparently seeing the backlash, Trump shared an AI-generated video of himself placing a new label on a New Mexico welcome sign.
Trump wears a cowboy hat during a bill-signing ceremony with members of the 1980 U.S. Olympic men’s ice hockey team in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., on December 12, 2025.
“New Mexico’s name isn’t up for debate—it’s been ours since before the United States existed,” New Mexico Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham said previously.
She dismissed the proposal as a distraction from price increases linked to the Iran war.
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“While the White House wastes time coloring on maps, Nuevo México is busy doing the work,” the governor added.
Despite the president’s statements, Trump does not have the authority to rename New Mexico.
Any formal effort to change the state’s name would have to originate in New Mexico because its current name is written into the state Constitution.
Democrats also criticized Trump last month after he first floated the renaming proposal.
“It’s New Mexico, always has been and always will be,” Senator Ben Ray Luján wrote in response. He then called Trump a “sinvergüenza,” using the Spanish term for a shameless person or scoundrel, and accused him of corruption.
Democratic Congresswoman Melanie Stansbury responded: “Oh hell no! Our state’s name carries generations of history, culture, and family—and it belongs to us. We’re New Mexicans. Period.”
Santa Fe, New Mexico
President Donald Trump stoked controversy by suggesting that New Mexico be renamed ‘New America’
Trump argued that ‘we are not Mexico, we are the United States of America!’
Back in late August, Trump signed an executive order officially changing Lake Ontario’s name to Lake America.
‘We defend Canada for nothing, we don’t get anything,’ he told reporters in the Oval Office when asked what prompted these changes. ‘We love the people of Canada, but their representatives aren’t doing an appropriate job.’
Trump said he has been thinking of this name change for a ‘long time’.
Trump teased then that the Atlantic and Pacific oceans could be next on his radar.
‘Actually, as you know, we took something called the Gulf of Mexico and we changed it, and now it’s very routinely the Gulf of America,’ Trump noted. ‘So, if you think about it, we have a Gulf and we have a lake. Now, all we need is an ocean. So, maybe we’ll have to change the name of the Atlantic and/or the Pacific.’
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