--- title: Simpsons Takes on Trump in a tale of two trumps short description: In “A Tale of Two Trumps” Trump proves he's no Ebeneezer Scrooge canonical: https://time.com/5215423/simpsons-tale-of-two-trumps/ author: Melissa Locker article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-03-26T15:44:16.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:51:37.805Z og:title: The Simpsons Give Donald Trump The Christmas Carol Treatment og:description: In “A Tale of Two Trumps” Trump proves he's no Ebeneezer Scrooge og:url: https://time.com/5215423/simpsons-tale-of-two-trumps/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb3716e9ffec4d4d/69892bffab6d7768426b2375/simpsonstrump.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: SimpsonsTrump og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Simpsons Give Donald Trump The Christmas Carol Treatment twitter:description: In “A Tale of Two Trumps” Trump proves he's no Ebeneezer Scrooge twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb3716e9ffec4d4d/69892bffab6d7768426b2375/simpsonstrump.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # _The Simpsons_ Give Donald Trump His Own _Christmas Carol_ Awakening by [Melissa Locker](https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Mar 26, 2018 3:44 PM UTC  by [Melissa Locker](https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Mar 26, 2018 3:44 PM UTC _The_ [_Simpsons_](http://time.com/5205438/homer-simpson-driving-license/?iid=sr-link1) writers seem to have been reading some Charles Dickens lately. In a new three-minute film, released over the weekend, President Donald Trump has an awakening straight out of the _A Christmas Carol_ playbook. In “A Tale of Two Trumps”, Trump takes a long hard look at himself in the mirror and reconsiders a few of his life choices_._ “You’ve been acting like a narcissistic sociopath and 64 percent to 67 percent of the people hate you!” he tells himself. While Ebeneezer Scrooge had his self-realization thanks to the visits of three Christmas spirits, Trump’s moment seems to have been triggered by headlines like “Jared Loses Access to Ivanka”, “[Trump](http://time.com/5215331/us-expels-russian-diplomats/?xid=homepage) Tweets Actual Fact By Mistake”, and “Putin Names Self U.S. Secretary of State”. While _Simpsons’_ Trump vows to do better, it may be too late to save his marriage to Melania, who is shown reading both Michael Wolff’s tell-all book _Fire and Fury_ and a book on pre-nup law. Like in Dickens’s _A Christmas Carol_, though, Trump soon awakens from his nightmare and realizes that it was all a dream. While Scrooge took the lesson to heart and went to share Christmas dinner with the Cratchit family, in the video, Trump rises from his bed to “tweet what’s deep in \[his\] heart” and all he can manage is—“Alec Baldwin wears a hairpiece. Sad!” Because _The Simpsons_ [predicted](http://time.com/4667462/simpsons-predictions-donald-trump-lady-gaga/) Trump’s presidency (and many [other news stories](http://time.com/5174912/olympics-2018-simpsons-curling-usa-prediction/?iid=sr-link8)), the events portrayed in “A Tale of Two Trumps” could always come true. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5215423/simpsons-tale-of-two-trumps/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5215423/simpsons-tale-of-two-trumps/"},"headline":"The Simpsons Give Donald Trump His Own Christmas Carol Awakening","datePublished":"2018-03-26T15:44:16.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:51:37.805Z","description":"In “A Tale of Two Trumps” Trump proves he's no Ebeneezer Scrooge","url":"https://time.com/5215423/simpsons-tale-of-two-trumps/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Television","The Simpsons","Donald Trump"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb3716e9ffec4d4d/69892bffab6d7768426b2375/simpsonstrump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Melissa Locker","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb3716e9ffec4d4d/69892bffab6d7768426b2375/simpsonstrump.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"SimpsonsTrump","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5215423/simpsons-tale-of-two-trumps/","name":"The Simpsons Give Donald Trump His Own Christmas Carol Awakening"}}]}] ```