April 1, 2022


During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Donald Trump devised a plan to evacuate all United States citizens to Antarctica, new sources close to the former Trump Administration revealed today. (Action Comedy News first reported on this story in 2021.) While the plague has been raging around the world and spiking repeatedly in areas around the country due to new variants, there have been no apparent cases on the frozen continent. 

Since tracking the spread of the deadly pandemic early in 2020, a Johns Hopkins map of the plague has never reported an occurrence of COVID-19 in Antarctica. When Trump first saw the map sometime in mid-2020, in a Highlights magazine, he came up with the idea of moving U.S. citizens there. He even drafted a Tweet:

“Great continent of the South Pole. Wonderful place. Cute penguins and no coronavirus! Their penguins are doing something that our top penguin Anthony Fauci can't. Let's go there now. Military can evacuate us. We have ships. We have warm coats, and can bivouac Burger King. Call us. Ivanka has your ticket.”

Reportedly, once the plan circulated around The White House, many in Trump’s administration were shocked, but today many are downplaying the idea, saying it was never part of any actual plan. 

“As always, in saying what he says, the President was exploring all options for the American people,” says then White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany. “Like injecting a disinfectant or drinking a hydroxychloroquine cocktail at a crowded beach bar, or storming the Capital to kill the Vice President, or taking any kind of advice from a doctor of African descent… the President likes to explore all possibilities for us to heal.”

When Trump asked his advisors for comments about the plan to place people on ships headed to a distant continent and other controversial statements, reaction from Trump administration officials ranged from curiosity to anger. Former Surgeon General Jerome Adams reportedly jumped onto his desk and said, “We can’t do this, people! Just get real! Any kind of cruising is still not something even I would try to do right now. It’s just too durn scary out there.”

With the presidential election looming at the time, the plan also reached high-level Democrats and prompted an immediate response within closed circles.

“The idea is preposterous,” said Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to her staff. “This was just another attempt to keep thousands of environmentally eco-conscious, nature-loving Democrats away from their polling locations by Election Day, luring them away to a place of pristine nature which, of course, is somewhere we’d all like to be right now, God help us.”

Many other Democrats agreed that the plan is not unlike the current Republican goal of limited voter access to ballots and denying them fresh, clean water while they wait at the polls.

A unidentified Senate worker said Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer agreed that the President’s plan appeared to be a plot targeted to non-Republicans. Schumer even prepared a statement referencing a controversial 2017 New York Times survey which revealed that of all United States citizens who knew of and could identify Antarctica on a map, 98% were Democrats, while more than 56% of Republicans said the possibility of anything actually being able to exist and not fall off a “so-called” South Pole was a “voodoo media hoax” and would be impossible anyway, “since the world is flat.”

Joe Biden, then running his campaign for the Democratic nomination, also knew of the plan, but would not comment today. However, an employee of a Dick’s Sporting Goods store near Wilmington, Delaware says he remembers seeing Biden buying 100 all-weather blankets and a couple dozen turtleneck sweaters around that time. “But he said nothing about going to Antarctica,” the employee, who wished to remain anonymous, added. “Biden is a frequent visitor to the store. He lives nearby and often came here just to sit at our picnic table display and have a beer by himself. I saw him holding a weathered photo of President Obama that he keeps in his wallet. Sometimes he cried. ‘Gosh, I hope that poor old guy gets elected,’ I thought to myself. ‘He needs something to do, and America just might be better for it.’ ”

As for Burger King being involved, Speaker Pelosi remained incredulous about this latest news from the Trump White House. “His brain is full of fat,” she said. “The President was again not in tune with what the American people need and want during a pandemic. Burger King is certainly not the answer. We need healthy things, like pretty scarves with N95 filters, more clean and sanitary hair salons like the one I go to every day, and a safe place to get Starbucks lattes and delicious gluten-free egg bites.”

A spokesperson for Burger King admitted the company has been in discussions about a contract to provide freeze-dried chicken nuggets to military personnel for many years. However, they would neither confirm nor deny reports that hundreds of “BK” mobile units were at anytime under construction in a secret factory near the United States Navy base in Norfolk, Virginia.

Former President Trump, and many of his former staff and cabinet would not respond to questions today. Others said it was indeed a plan, but Trump lost interest when someone told him the United States did not own Antarctica and could not easily buy it. However, one leading Republican said he thought the whole story sounded like an April Fool’s Day prank.

Photo by Christopher Michel