Up Close Photos Of Donald Trump's Greasy Makeup We Wish We Could Unsee

Forget the truth about Roswell and UFO cover-ups; America's greatest mystery involves a different kind of cover-up. Inquiring minds want to know: Does Donald Trump's orange essence come from makeup, a tanning bed, self-tanner, or some combination of the color enhancers that is clearly not working for him? And why does his visage look so greasy sometimes?

In 2019, a White House official told The New York Times that Trump does not use bronzer, and they credited his genetics for his skin's mercurial tint. But that same year, Trump's former housekeepers informed The Washington Post that Trump was using a liquid product from a brand called Bronx Colors when they worked for him (a company executive told Vox it was likely an orange color-correcting concealer). Trump's more natural-looking complexion in photos of him golfing also suggests that he's using makeup to make himself orange. As for the greasiness, he could have naturally oily skin, and maybe he's exacerbating the issue by using the wrong products.

It could also be the result of sweat, which Jimmy Kimmel believed was the case when Piers Morgan interviewed Trump in 2022. "We always spend so much time talking about his lies and the terrible things he does, we sometimes forget that his face looks like a glazed ham," the host quipped on "Jimmy Kimmel Live." Whatever the case, these photos of Trump will leave you reaching for oil blotting sheets.

Donald Trump vowed to drain the swamp, but his pores were doing the purging in this July 2019 pic snapped outside the White House. The photog did him dirty by zooming in on his T-zone's torrential downpour, which had turned his makeup into an oily, swampy mess.

This sweat sesh came some years after Trump said of his future Secretary of State at a 2015 rally, "I have never seen a young person sweat like Marco Rubio. ... Putin's going to look at him and say, 'What the hell is wrong with this guy?'"

At the 2020 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Donald Trump decided to greet Old Glory by grabbing her and pulling her close. His bronzer was gleaming, while the skin around his eyes almost matched the white of the flag's bright stars. Trump might be obsessed with putting his stamp on every American symbol, from paper money to the Rose Garden, but the Star-Spangled Banner really doesn't need a sun-kissed glow.

Donald Trump's skin was a little oily and a lot orange during an April 2020 press briefing, but the biggest issue in the above photo is that startling mask of stark white skin. Maybe he aggressively rubbed the bronzer off around his eyes, or perhaps he swapped his tanning goggles for aviators. For someone so desperate to look tan, Trump has a history of exposing his real skin color, which matches his bleached hair. And when his hair is yellow, it gives him a candy corn color palette.

His bizarre makeup choices sometimes make Donald Trump look like a zany professor experimenting with a new fake tan formula, but he's kind of giving Tangerine Wolverine in this 2020 photo. There are a bunch of spots missing makeup on his face, including around and between his eyebrows, which makes them look larger and bushier. One photographer's theory is that Trump's orange bronzer gets more intense when he's stressed, and given that he was prepping for a debate with Joe Biden here, he might've been been on edge. (Stress might also explain the sweat spots on his nose and cheeks.)

Donald Trump's sweat was flowing when he faced off against Joe Biden in the first 2020 presidential debate. But unlike most of his face, one spot wasn't glistening like a freshly scooped snow cone drizzled with a generous amount of orange syrup: his upper lip. Perhaps the dryness was related to what Marco Rubio said about Trump's 2016 debate glam. "He had this little makeup thing applying, like makeup around his mustache," Rubio recalled, per ABC News, "because he had one of those sweat mustaches."

Donald Trump's upper lip also stood out during a 2022 rally in Arizona, but this time it was because it happened to be the most bronzed part of his face. Frankly, the mustache area matched the color of the state's sandstone mesas. It looked like he had sweated off most of his bronzer, save for what he had smeared on underneath his nose. Perhaps his previous experience with that area perspiring excessively had him really piling on the setting powder.

Was Donald Trump trying to pull off Ben Stiller's Blue Steel pout from "Zoolander" while addressing the media during his civil fraud trial in late 2023? If so, it could use some work; the really, really, really ridiculously good-looking model would never step out with concealer lips like that. The president's version kind of calls to mind silent film star Clara Bow, while the rest of his oily makeup is 50 shades of orange, red, and white.

When Donald Trump visited Graceland in March 2026, it called to mind the one time he claimed he's been compared to Elvis Presley. One thing he clearly has in common with the late singer is a tendency to sweat buckets on stage, but looking at this January 2024 picture of Trump puckering up in Vegas, where the King once reigned, it's hard to imagine him pulling off Presley's famous lip curl. His parched pout could also used a swipe of lip balm.

When it came time to hold court with the media during his 2024 hush money trial, Donald Trump's hair and face looked borderline drenched. (Perhaps he was hoping to slip out of justice's grasp with his well-lubricated look.) While it looked like the area around his eyes was more blended in with the rest of his mug than usual, his yellow tie unfortunately really brought out the yellow tones in his greasepaint. 

Donald Trump often braves Florida's blazing sun and high humidity to hit the links at one of his multiple golf courses in the state, but his appearance at his Doral Golf Club on July 9, 2024, was for business, not pleasure. During a rally, he addressed his supporters in a MAGA hat, which spared him the indignity of his hair getting plastered to his forehead. However, there was no stopping his melting bronzer from making him look like a freshly glazed donut. We can only imagine what his shirt collar looked like at the end of the day.

Ahead of the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump went beyond orange and ventured into red alert territory, possibly displaying the bronzer equivalent of eyebrow blindness. "He has orange blindness or fake tan blindness," makeup artist Safia Cox told the Mirror in 2024. The shade of orange was up there with a chicken wing doused in a hot sauce that's ridiculously high on the Scoville scale and has a colorful name promising pain, à la one of the sauces that's sure to send a celebrity into a coughing fit on an episode of "Hot Ones."

With so much oil production apparently happening on his face, you'd think Donald Trump would enjoy talking Texas tea. However, when Doug Burgum started droning on about Venezuelan oil during a 2026 cabinet meeting, Trump wanted to circle back to something else. "Forget that. When are they going to do the statue [of me]?" he said. But who needs a statue when you can bronze yourself, as Trump did for a 2024 town hall event? His gleaming chin was especially toasted, making it look like he had a beard.

Donald Trump turned up the dial on the orange tint as the presidential election drew closer in October 2024. His color here is so blindingly bright that it almost disguises the oily film coating his T-zone. And yes, he's very aware that his unnatural Orange Crush color is an issue. In a 2023 Truth Social rant about the Trump-friendly program "Fox & Friends," he wrote, "They purposely show the absolutely worst pictures of me, especially the big 'orange' one with my chin pulled way back."

The glass skin trend is popular with fans of the clean makeup aesthetic; you might have seen the luminous look on Hailey Bieber's flawless face. While Donald Trump doesn't seem like one to keep up with the latest beauty trends, he almost achieved the look himself during an October 2024 rally in Coachella, somewhere you'd expect to see Bieber, albeit in much different circumstances. But with its earthy color, Trump's skin had more of a glazed terracotta pottery thing going on.

For an October 2024 rally in Wisconsin, Donald Trump clearly wanted to make sure his supporters didn't miss him on the stage. His orange safety vest with reflective tape was only a few shades brighter than his incandescent makeup, which made his head resemble one of those amber caution lights on the pilot cars that accompany wide loads. You might also see them flashing on a garbage truck like the one Trump took a spin in while wearing his vest.

The theory that at least some of Donald Trump's color comes from fake tan is supported by the small white lines that sometimes appear on the sides of his eyes; they could be the result of Trump squeezing his eyes shut as he gets sprayed by the tanning product. In this April 2025 photo snapped during a meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu, the creases resembled the iconic fake eyelashes that Malcolm McDowell's character wears in "A Clockwork Orange." At least they distracted from his oily makeup, which really settled into his fine lines.

When he visited the Abrahamic Family House in Abu Dhabi in May 2025, Donald Trump scribbled his name in the guestbook and showed off his supersized signature. It's just a shame it wouldn't have been socially acceptable to press his face against the book's pages, as his skin was in desperate need of some serious blotting. What's more, the bright pink patches under his eyes and between his brows were the wrong kind of eye-catching.

Donald Trump threw any notion of keeping church and state separate out the window when he made a campaign stop at Dream City Church for a Turning Point PAC event in June 2025. His makeup also apparently tried to separate from his face while he spoke. Or maybe all the moisture clearly visible in the above photo was nothing but sweat? Either way, he looked like he could use some mattifying powder.

Donald Trump broke a sweat while pretending to be a transgender weightlifter during a July 2025 White House luncheon. When he raised his arms to hoist up his invisible barbell, the mocking movement revealed how much darker his makeup was than his hands. He also had a tiny splotch of white skin underneath his nose that matched the patches around his eyes and eyebrows that would lead one to suspect he missed a spot when applying whatever product he happened to be wearing. 

During a September 2025 press conference in Aylesbury, England, Donald Trump's greasy makeup called to mind the texture of a buttered crumpet. His chin area especially seemed to be missing its coating of six-week-beach-vacation lacquer. He might have been a bit cheesed off had he noticed the bare spot; according to makeup artist Kriss Blevens, Trump felt that his favorite product wasn't caked on enough when she did his makeup. "He asked for more bronzer and I had a talk with him about trusting me," she once told HuffPost.

At her late husband's September 2025 memorial service, Erika Kirk pressed her forehead against Donald Trump's cheek and risked coming away with an oil slick on her forehead. Trump definitely could have used some of her mattifying powder, and according to Stephanie Grisham, he's not opposed to wearing the product. In her book "I'll Take Your Questions Now," the former press secretary claimed that he once borrowed some of her powder. "The president felt he looked 'shiny,'" she wrote (via Business Insider).

Donald Trump is no stranger to being likened to a jack-o'-lantern. During his first term, for example, Trumpkins were all the rage throughout the Halloween season. And on a 2022 episode of "Jimmy Kimmel Live," Trump's sworn enemy, Jimmy Kimmel played a dramatic voiceover that compared the former reality star to "a pumpkin slathered in margarine." Alas, on Halloween in 2025, his shining, autumnal bronzer-coated face did not look nearly as smooth.  

When he took the stage at a fast food event, you better believe Donald Trump's makeup looked greasy enough to fry a Filet-O-Fish. You could just smell the vegetable oil sizzling as he addressed the crowd at the McDonald's Impact Summit, but the arches over his eyes were white, not golden. The tip of his nose also could have used a dip in whatever that special sauce is that makes him look sorta sun-kissed (or like a double-fried fry).

For someone who is as obsessed with gold things as Donald Trump is, he sure seems to love wearing bronze. Look no further than when he received his gold FIFA Peace Prize medal during the 2026 World Cup Official Draw. 

On the "Advisory Opinions" podcast, Chris Christie said that Trump once offered to powder his face on Air Force One. He also revealed that Trump is his own makeup artist, so who knows? Maybe the president will win a UFC award for best makeup someday.

At the 2025 Kennedy Center Honors medal presentation dinner, Donald Trump started rambling on about the air conditioning for his big beautiful ballroom, possibly because he was inwardly cursing whoever had set the thermostat at the U.S. Department of State building where the event was held. While it's probably not the denomination of currency he would like to be associated with, the bronzed and seemingly sweaty president was giving shiny new penny.

No wonder Donald Trump wanted to shut down The Kennedy Center and give it a facelift. The first item on his agenda might have been new lighting, as it was not playing nicely at all with his makeup during a January 2026 House Republican retreat at the venue he tacked his name onto. Alas, under the lighting, his bronzed visage seemed to have an almost greenish luster.

Donald Trump was sweating like a hunk of Swiss cheese on a summer picnic when he spoke at the 2026 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland. But the 11 lines on his forehead were proof that his bronzer or fake tan was still at least partially intact, as they were almost as white as his teeth. Still, he didn't have on enough makeup to even out his skin tone.

Donald Trump didn't look outrageously orange when he gave the Supreme Court a piece of his mind for taking away some of his tariff powers in February 2026, but he appeared pretty outraged. His skin reflected his foul mood, as he could have given it a little TLC before appearing on camera. Whatever product he happened to be wearing was not doing the natural texture of his skin any favors, especially around the T-zone.

At a 2019 conference in Baltimore, Donald Trump tried to blame energy-efficient lighting for his unnatural hue. "The bulb that we're being forced to use, number one, to me, most importantly, I always look orange," he complained, per CNN. But this March 2026 photo proves that his makeup is the same citrusy shade outside. His fluorescent bronzer's oily sheen and the other bright colors in the image, including Karoline Leavitt's neon pink blazer, make it look especially garish. It's also not blended in around his hairline.