Donald Trump said Google rejected his request to rename the Atlantic Ocean after himself or America.
Speaking at a rally in South Carolina on Wednesday, the president said he had called Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai, to ask whether the company could “handle” his proposal.
“I only like two oceans: the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. I’m not going to put either Trump or America on any other ocean but these two. So we seriously looked at the Atlantic Ocean, and I called Google Maps , who were really great with the lake … They’re still rattled from the Gulf. I said: ‘Sundar, I’m thinking of the Atlantic Ocean,’” Trump said.
Trump referenced his previous executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, as well as his push to rename Lake Ontario as Lake America amid a trade feud between the US and Canada, for which he also signed an executive order requiring US federal agencies to use his new moniker.
According to Trump, Pichai rejected the latest proposal. Trump described the Google CEO’s response by saying, “No, no, no. This time I’m not doing it … Oceans are different, sir. They cover … a lot of countries. Please don’t ask us to do that.”
“So I’ll probably pass. Should I pass it?” Trump said, adding: “I think let’s keep it the Atlantic Ocean.”
The Guardian has approached Google for comment.
Google has previously acceded to Trump’s demands for name changes, which triggered public criticism including from Mexico and Canada . On Google Maps, the locations themselves are labeled “Gulf of America” and “Lake America” for US users, while search results display the new names alongside the original names in parentheses. Users in Mexico and Canada, meanwhile, continue to see the original names.
Trump has also previously floated renaming the strait of Hormuz after himself. Last month, amid the US’s ongoing war with Iran, he wrote on Truth Social: “Should we change the name Hormuz Strait to TRUMP STRAIT??? Like America itself, it would be ‘hotter’ than ever before!”
