# 2016 United States Presidential Election The 2016 United States Presidential Election was the November 8, 2016 race between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump that doubled as one of the most meme-saturated political events in internet history. It birthed viral moments from Chris Christie's blank stare on Super Tuesday to the weaponization of Pepe the Frog as a pro-Trump avatar. ## Overview The 2016 United States Presidential Election was the 58th quadrennial US presidential race, held on November 8, 2016, between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump[4]. Trump won the electoral college and took office as the 45th president, but the more lasting online legacy of the campaign is the sheer volume of memes it generated in the year leading up to it. As an internet event, the 2016 United States Presidential Election is remembered less for policy fights than for a stream of viral moments: Chris Christie's frozen stare behind Trump on Super Tuesday[2], the Twitter meltdown that accompanied every debate and primary night[3], and the mutation of Pepe the Frog from a chill cartoon character into a political avatar[1]. Both campaigns spilled directly into meme feeds, and the election became a case study in how political coverage, shitposting, and image macros bled into each other. The race also marked the moment mainstream news outlets started treating memes as campaign artifacts worth reporting on, including the Clinton campaign publicly denouncing a cartoon frog in September 2016[1]. ## How It Spread Reaction to Christie's Super Tuesday appearance moved fastest on Twitter, where journalists and users pushed jokes like "Is Christie being held hostage by the Trump campaign?" and "If you took this video back in time a year and showed it to Chris Christie, he would strangle you"[3]. Vox rounded up the best tweets the same night, which locked the "sad Christie" screengrab in as a recurring image throughout the rest of the primary calendar[3]. The same Vox roundup captured jokes about Marco Rubio's collapse, Trump's hands, and the general vibe of Republican commentators pleading with Fairfax County to save them[3]. The frog part of the election meme story picked up over the summer. Pepe the Frog, a character created by artist Matt Furie in 2005 for his comic Boy's Club, was being adopted by pro-Trump accounts on Twitter and 4chan as a mascot[1]. On September 10, 2016, Donald Trump Jr. tweeted a modified poster for the film The Expendables titled "The Deplorables," which photoshopped Trump supporters into the cast and included Pepe wearing a Trump wig[1]. The Clinton campaign publicly denounced the frog on Tuesday, September 27, 2016, and MSNBC's Chris Hayes described the moment as reporters encountering people with "Nazi frog avatars" who were "tweeting about the Jews"[1]. The Trump/Christie dynamic kept generating headlines through the primary too. On CNN, Trump gave a widely mocked answer about David Duke and white supremacist support, later blaming a faulty earpiece[2]. Six New Jersey newspapers used the moment to jointly call on Christie to resign the governorship, writing "What an embarrassment. What an utter disgrace"[2]. ## How to Use The 2016 election meme set is less a single template than a bag of recurring images. The Chris Christie Super Tuesday screengrab is typically used as a reaction image for hostage-situation jokes, buyer's remorse, or watching someone you endorsed embarrass you in real time[3]. The Deplorables poster format is often edited with different faces to signal in-group political affiliation[1]. Pepe images from the era are still recycled in political shitposts, though the character's meaning shifted heavily depending on who was posting it after 2016[1]. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is 2016 United States Presidential Election? It was the November 8, 2016 US presidential race between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, which Trump won, and which produced a huge run of viral online moments and image macros[4]. ### Where did 2016 United States Presidential Election come from? The election itself was the 58th quadrennial presidential race, preceded by Democratic and Republican primaries that were tracked online in unusually high volume[4]. ### What does 2016 United States Presidential Election mean? As a meme reference, it points to the cluster of viral images, tweets, and characters like Pepe the Frog and "sad Chris Christie" that came out of the campaign year[1][3]. ### How do you use 2016 United States Presidential Election? People typically reference specific artifacts from it, like the Christie Super Tuesday reaction shot for hostage or regret jokes, or the Deplorables poster format for group-affiliation edits[2][1]. ### Is 2016 United States Presidential Election still popular? The election is a classic reference point for political memes and is still cited when explaining how internet culture and campaigns collided, with Pepe images and Christie screengrabs still recirculating[1][3]. ### Why did Chris Christie's face go viral on Super Tuesday? Standing behind Trump at a March 1, 2016 press conference, Christie looked visibly miserable on camera, days after Trump had told him to "get on the plane and go home"[2]. ### What is the Deplorables poster? It's a September 10, 2016 image Donald Trump Jr. tweeted, a photoshopped riff on The Expendables movie poster with Trump supporters and Pepe the Frog in a Trump wig[1]. ### Why did the Clinton campaign attack a cartoon frog? By late September 2016, Pepe the Frog had been adopted as an avatar by pro-Trump and white nationalist accounts online, and the Clinton campaign publicly denounced the character on September 27, 2016[1]. ### Who created Pepe the Frog? Artist Matt Furie created Pepe in the early 2000s for his comic Boy's Club, originally as a chill, good natured character with no political meaning[1]. ### What was the Trump David Duke controversy? Days after Christie's endorsement, Trump told CNN's Jake Tapper he knew "nothing about David Duke" or white supremacists, then later blamed a faulty earpiece[2]. ## References 1. [https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/its-not-easy-being-green/499892/]() 2. [https://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/01/politics/chris-christie-donald-trump-face/]() 3. [https://www.vox.com/2016/3/1/11144526/super-tuesday-results-twitter]() 4. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/2016-united-states-presidential-election]() 5. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diaCHYO7haY]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/2016-united-states-presidential-election Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library