Did Donald Trump say Mexicans call him ‘peachy, cool arrow’? No, this clip is altered

Over the years, President Donald Trump has had some critical words for Mexico, including when he launched his first presidential bid and said Mexico sends the U.S. “rapists” and people who “bring crime.”

As news of his second-term move to threaten, impose — and then pause — tariffs against the United States’ southern neighbor broke, a Jan. 30 Instagram video spread that seemed to show Trump talking about how Mexicans perceive him.   

“Mexicans have no hard feelings toward me. They adore me. They have a nickname for me: ‘Cool arrow.’ I mean, what’s cooler than an arrow? They’ll be like, ‘Hey, cool arrow!’ Sometimes they’ll call me a ‘peachy, cool arrow,’” Trump appears to say in the clip.

(Screenshot from Instagram)

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This video is a more sophisticated version of an old claim, variations of which were circulating as early as 2017. Snopes published a fact-check on a similar claim in 2020.

But Trump never said that.

“Peachy, cool arrow,” sounds like “pinche culero,” which is an expletive in Spanish.

The Instagram video showed markers of a deepfake, such as Trump’s mouth movements not syncing with audio. Trump’s attire and background in the video match those in an interview with NBC News’ Lester Holt, uploaded May 11, 2017. 

Trump’s movements match those in a portion of the clip from 12:30 to 12:42. He said the following: “But when I spoke with (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, he asked me whether or not I would see (Russian Foreign Minister Sergei) Lavrov. Now what do I, should I say, ‘No, I’m not gonna see him’? I said, ‘I will see him.’ During that discussion with Lavrov, I think we had a great discussion having to do with Syria, having to do with Ukraine.”

We found no evidence that Trump said Mexicans call him “peachy, cool arrow.” We rate this claim False.

By

Loreben Tuquero

Staff writer

February 6, 2025

Truth-o-meter Ruling

False

IF YOUR TIME IS SHORT

• A video seems to show President Donald Trump saying Mexicans call him a "peachy, cool arrow." It was altered from a 2017 clip.

Statement

Video shows President Donald Trump saying Mexicans call him “peachy cool arrow.”

Context

an Instagram post

Speaker/Target

Speaker: Instagram posts

Statement Date

January 30, 2025