Donald Trump doubles down on ambitious plan to rename Atlantic or Pacific as 'Trump Ocean'
President Donald Trump has doubled down on his most ambitious geographical plan yet, after floating the idea of renaming either the Atlantic or the Pacific Ocean after himself before he leaves the White House for a second time.
Addressing a roaring crowd of supporters at a rally in Clarksville, Tennessee, the 80-year-old commander-in-chief suggested that one of the planet's two largest bodies of water should be formally rechristened as "Trump Ocean" or the "Ocean of the Americas."
The declaration came as Trump reflected on his ongoing efforts to overhaul the names of famous waterways and landmarks across North America, telling the audience that he wants to secure another major rebranding victory before his time in office concludes.
"So we've got the Gulf. We've got a beautiful lake. Now somebody you need a river," Trump told the crowd. "I don't want to change the name of the Hudson River. That's too much. Henry Hudson did a good job setting up that sucker a long time ago."
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Turning his sights toward a vastly larger target, the president continued: "So we need a river and we need an ocean, so I was thinking of either the Atlantic or the Pacific. We'll call it Trump Ocean or Ocean of the Americas."
Trump made it clear to the crowd that he intends to see the massive shift enacted before his second administration wraps up. "We should have—before I get out, I think we should have a ocean or we need a great river," he insisted, while reassuring attendees that at least one iconic waterway would remain safe from his pen: "Now I'm not changing the name of the Mississippi."
While he spoke about the idea at length during the rally, it is far from the first time the US President has floated the idea, having first brought it to light back in August.
“We have a gulf and we have a lake,” Trump, told reporters in the Oval Office at the time. “Now all we need is an ocean. Maybe we’ll have to change the name of the Atlantic and/or the Pacific. Maybe we’ll change them both.”
The bold proposal marks the latest escalation in Trump's crusade to reshape American cartography under his "America First" agenda.
Shortly after returning to the White House following his second inauguration in January 2025, Trump ordered US federal agencies to replace the Gulf of Mexico with the "Gulf of America," calling it a "beautiful name" that covers significant territory, even as foreign neighbors like Mexico and Cuba maintain standard international naming conventions.
He expanded the initiative in August by targeting Lake Ontario, one of the five Great Lakes shared between the United States and Canada.
In a video shared to TikTok on August 26, Trump declared that "all it takes is a good pen and some intelligence," famously taking a black Sharpie to a physical map to cross out the original name and replace it with "LAKE AMERICA."
Trump has also reversed an Obama-era decision regarding North America’s tallest peak, stripping away the Indigenous Alaskan title of Denali to restore its previous federal name, Mount McKinley, honoring the nation's 25th president.
Topics: Donald Trump, US News
Phoebe Tonks