OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
A Pennsylvania mother who was served by former President Trump at McDonald’s shared the one request she made when he appeared at the drive-thru window on Sunday.
During his visit, Trump cooked and served French fries to customers while accusing his 2024 opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, of fabricating claims about having worked at the fast food chain.
A clip of Nayara Andrejczyk arriving at the drive-thru window where Trump was waiting with her order went viral, as online users focused on a comment she made to the former president during their brief encounter.
“Mr. President, please don’t let the U.S. become Brazil, my native Brazil, please,” Andrejczyk pleaded.
“We’re gonna make it better than ever, ok?” Trump said, shaking her hand while continuing to greet an assembled crowd through the drive-thru window.
The Pennsylvania resident, who immigrated to the U.S. from Brazil 26 years ago, was asked about the remark in an interview on Fox News’ “The Story” on Monday.
“My parents were victims of Brazilian corruption, government corruption,” she told anchor Martha MacCallum. “My mom lost a pretty successful business…almost 30 years ago, and that’s the reason why we moved to the United States.
“I am very grateful for this country. I love this country,” she continued. “And I don’t want to see this country become the corrupt sewage that Brazil is at this moment, where politicians do whatever they want with no accountability to the people.”
WATCH:
“Mr. President, please don’t let the United States become Brazil!” pic.twitter.com/ZEgujQMS35
— Margo Martin (@margommartin) October 20, 2024
Andrejczyk mentioned that she had been invited to a Trump campaign event but was unaware that the former president would actually be working at the drive-thru window until she began to hear the excitement from the car in front of her.
“There was no stunt over there. Of course, we knew something was up because of the level of security,” she said, but “it was a great surprise to see him there….he’s a very charismatic person and very relatable.”
She added that she felt like her short interaction with Trump was akin to “meeting a friend.”
“He looked us in the eye. The way he communicated with us, the way he greeted my children in the back seat. It was incredible. My kids were [saying] I can’t believe I shook Donald Trump’s hand,” she said. “I’m not going to wash my hands for the next couple of days. He was very genuine. He’s a genuine man.”
Trump smiled as he cooked fries and handed out orders to customers, praising the branch manager and promising to improve America if he were elected president again, according to Fox News Digital’s Brooke Singman, who accompanied him during his shift, the outlet reported.
Trump’s critics have faced backlash online for attempting to downplay his McDonald’s visit as “staged,” while his supporters emphasized the evident security measures in place for the former president, who has experienced multiple assassination attempts.
Ohio Republican Sen. J.D. Vance, who is Trump’s running mate, responded to the media’s scrutiny of Trump’s McDonald’s “shift” during a subsequent appearance on the network.
“The fact that these people are accusing him of a ‘stage-managed’ thing… of course, the president has to have security because there have been two attempts on his life in the last eight weeks. He can’t just walk into a McDonald’s and sign a W-9 and actually go on the payroll. That’s just not how this works, especially given the security threats on his life,” he said.
“But look, he was interacting with people. He was talking to the employees. He was giving people food, and he was just [doing] I think what he does best, which is just being among the people, talking to them about what they care about. He showed genuine interest in the employees and their lives and where they came from and what they were actually doing in their job, and that’s something you can’t stage, and you can’t fake,” Vance added.
