Brendan Shefford, aka Big Red, a high profile real estate agent and a candidate for the Ka Maina Rolleston Ward in Selwyn, is an unabashed Trump fan.
So his billboards have taken on the Trumpism, Make Selwyn Great Again, including the four stars.
“To be fair, I’m in line with him around the no woke bulls**t, getting rid of the red tape, look after the locals first, that’s basically what I stand for,” said Shefford.
“People compared me to Trump anyway, even before Trump was Trump, just because I was in the real estate sector.”
Shefford said if he lived in the United States he would have voted for Trump.
“We are now living in a world where intelligent people are being silenced so that stupid people won’t be offended,” Shefford said.
Canterbury University media and communication professor Donald Matheson said while the slogan is well-known, it does come with a risk.
“My sense is ‘make Selwyn great again’ is associating that candidate with a particular kind of right-wing politics. He is speaking to his people, but he risks alienating a whole lot of people.”
Said Shefford: “You are never going to please everyone. The feedback I’ve had is that a lot of people probably agree with Trump but are just too scared to publicly admit it.”
In Ashburton’s mayoral race, candidate Jeff Ryan ditched his Make Ashburton Great Again slogan a week after he launched it due to public feedback after he realised it was associated with anti-Trump sentiment.
Ryan said he was not a Trump supporter.
‘‘I look at him and think ‘there’s a lot of good he does’. But he undoes that good with a lot of crazy comments, and I think he’s reckless as a politician,’’ Ryan said.
He defended choosing the slogan in the first place.
‘‘I just thought it was a catchy sort of a phrase,’’ Ryan said.
