European Parliament’s ‘Orange Plague’ insult to Trump: Statue depicting overweight, bare president is placed on show
A gold-coated statue of President Donald Trump titled the Orange Plague was put on display in the European Parliament building.
The 8.5ft-tall statue depicts the US leader overweight and naked holding a long, gold club and sitting on the shoulders of a shorter man.
Danish artist Jens Galschiot created the statue, which is a direct insult to Mr Trump, and is said to have coated the satirical statue with 23-karat gold leaf.
The figure, which sits in the building in Strasbourg, France, is also known by the name of the ‘King of Injustice’ – and is the latest flashpoint in the worsening transatlantic rift.
‘I am sitting on the back of a man. He is sinking under my burden,’ the description card underneath the statue reads.
‘I would do anything to help him. Except stepping down from his back – The King of Injustice.’
The unflattering statue stands at an intersection that connects two of the parliament’s buildings, where it will remain until Thursday.
The piece protests against Mr Trump’s approach to climate change, with Mr Galschiot describing it as a ‘satirical outcry’ against the ‘US assault on the green transition and the rule-based world order’.
The 2.5-metre tall statue named the ‘Orange Plague’ depicts the US leader overweight and naked, holding a long gold club and sitting on the shoulders of a shorter man
It follows Mr Trump immediately shredding the US’s climate policies when he returned to the White House in January 2025 and his description of climate change as a ‘con job’, leading to an international outcry.
The president’s anti-green moves included repealing the 2009 EPA Endangerment Finding, and withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement pledge to keep the increase in global average temperature to well below 2C above pre-industrial levels.
Domestically, the Trump administration also paused clean energy funding from the Inflation Reduction Act, and promoted domestic fossil fuel production – igniting strained relations with Brussels.
Yet members of the European Parliament have brushed aside concerns over how the US leader might react to the artwork.
Left-wing European Parliament politician Per Clausen, who invited the artist, told news outlet DW: ‘If someone is so thin-skinned that they cannot tolerate this sculpture being exhibited in the European Parliament, then they have no place on the world stage.’
Mr Trump has not commented on the statue, which has also featured in other European cities as well as at the COP30 UN climate conference in Belem, Brazil, last year.
It is said to head to the COP31 UN Climate Conference in Turkey in November.
The figure deals another blow to the already fraught relationship between Washington and the EU.
Mr Trump has frequently portrayed the EU as a political and economic rival that takes advantage of the US on trade, criticised Brussels’ bureaucracy, supported Brexit, and argued that European countries should do more for their own defence.
Throughout both his first and second presidencies, his tariff threats and ‘America First’ agenda have often put Washington at odds with EU leaders, leading to repeated tensions across trade, security and foreign policy.
In 2018, the US President described the EU as one of his greatest ‘foes’ and described the body as ‘very difficult’.
Despite seemingly improved relations, the proposal of Canada becoming the EU’s first ever associate member immediately threw this trajectory into disarray – as Mr Trump threatened the body with ‘serious tariffs’.
The US president said that if the EU moved forward with the plan, Washington could impose ‘very serious tariffs or stop trading with Europe’. He added: ‘If it’s a good intention, that’s fine. If it’s a bad intention, we’ll put very heavy tariffs on.’
It is, however, not the first time Mr Galschiot has used his political views as a muse for artwork.
In 2000, the artist erected a sculpture named the Pillar of Shame in Belem as a commemoration of the Eldorado massacre – which saw 19 landless people killed by military police. It still stands in Brazil today.
