Unearthed 1950s TV show has a con man called Trump tricking people into paying for a wall
The episode, titled 'The End of the World', aired on CBS in 1958
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Your support makes all the difference.An episode of a 1950s Western TV series has resurfaced because of its surprising parallels to real-life.
Trackdown, which ran for two seasons between 1957 and 1959, had an instalment called “The End of the World” that featured a rabble-rousing doomsayer named Trump who scares the townsfolk by claiming disaster is on its way. He believes he’s the only one who can save them, and his method is... to build a wall.
Dialogue in the episode, which starred Robert Culp, finds one character pleading with a law enforcer to “stop” Trump from “taking the down”.
Another moment sees a rabble-rousing Trump attempting to convince people of his wall-building plan:
Trump: “I can build a wall around your homes that nothing will penetrate.”
Civilian: “What do we do? How do we save ourselves?”
Trump: “You ask how do you build that wall.”
The end of the episode sees Trump arrested and charged with being a fraud after threatening legal action for being branded dishonest.
This particular episode of Trackdown was noted by several outlets after Donald Trump began talking about a proposed border wall between the US and Mexico
During the election, The San Francisco Chronicle stated that Trump’s speech in the 1958 episode was “so similar” to the president’s that “it almost seems as if Donald Trump borrowed some catchphrases”.
U2 reportedly used footage from the episode as part of their Joshua Tree 30th anniversary tour in 2017.
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