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Former President Donald Trump's collection of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) has, according to him, "made history" after selling out within "hours" despite being ruthlessly mocked for their release.
The exclusive digital trading cards were revealed by Trump on Thursday for a starting price of $99 each. According to data from the NFT marketplace OpenSea, however, the value of each card had doubled in price on the secondary market after they sold out within one day.
On Friday, Trump boasted to his followers on his Truth Social account about the record sellout time and thanked those who had bought one.
"WE MADE HISTORY!" the former president wrote. "My Trump Digital Trading Cards sold out in hours. Congratulations to the collectors. Thank you."
Trump first teased that he would be making a "major announcement" earlier in the week, but ended up leaving several of his MAGA supporters disappointed with the news on Thursday. Several users on Twitter had speculated that the announcement, which came exactly one month after Trump announced his presidential candidacy, would be related to his running-mate pick for 2024 or news regarding one of his many major legal battles.
Some longtime supporters of the ex-president, including his former White House chief strategist Steven Bannon, seemed to reach a breaking point over the NFTs instead, as Bannon told his podcast listeners Thursday, "I can't do this anymore."
Daniel Bostic, one of the lead organizers behind the "Stop the Steal" movement, also tweeted on Thursday that if the NFTs were "the #MAJORANNOUNCEMENT it is embarrassing and a slap in the face to Trump's base."
Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro added on his talk show Friday that Trump's disappointing announcement "almost completely craters his presidential campaign before it even gets off the ground."
Even among the widespread backlash, however, roughly 14,000 people purchased at least one or more of the online tokens within a 12-hour window, according to OpenSea data. The entire 45,000 NFTs collection was also valued around $570,000 as of Friday morning.
Conservative commentator Larry Elder said during Fox11's talk show This Issue Is Friday night that the former president's "mission" for his trading cards "was for us to talk about Trump."
"Mission accomplished," he added. "He's a very savvy business guy, and that's what he was doing."
"The mission was for us to talk about Trump. Mission Accomplished."@larryelder reacts to @realDonaldTrump's "Major Announcement," an NFT collection.@GloriaAllred tells @Elex_Michaelson Trump's "monetizing the fact he WAS POTUS and that he's popular among a shrinking base..." pic.twitter.com/I0au5xQ3ar
— The Issue Is (@TheIssueIsShow) December 17, 2022
Women's rights attorney Gloria Allred, who also joined This Issue Is on Friday, added that Trump was "monetizing" off his former White House status "among a very small and shrinking base of his supporters."
"He's trying to make as much money as he can," Allred said. "It's all going to him personally, by the way. It's not going to his campaign."
According to the Donald Trump Digital Trading Card website, the NFTs were "not political and have nothing to do with any political campaign."
Newsweek has reached out to Trump's team for comment.
About the writer
Kaitlin Lewis is a Newsweek reporter on the Night Team based in Boston, Massachusetts. Her focus is reporting on national ... Read more