Not everyone thinks I should do this. I’m told that covering Trump mobile is “playing into their hands,” adding, “It’s clear fraud.” [doesn’t need] More publicity,” and that “We literally don’t need to read about this every week.” And those are just the good messages – you may not want to see some of the other messages.
Still, I think it’s a fair question. Why forenoon Every week I write here about a phone that, as far as we can tell, doesn’t actually exist? Why didn’t we call it bad and impossible and move on with our lives?
The short answer is: because it matters.
The long answer is: we can’t go any further because it’s still ongoing, and it still requires reporting. This is what will happen if the T1 Phone 8002 just arrives at buyers’ homes and turns out to be a real, perhaps quite bad, smartphone. But no one has a phone yet. nobody has any saw The phone still. And Trump Mobile has gone suspiciously silent, with no updates on its website or social media profiles for months.
It also fits perfectly The Verge‘s street. You want us to stay connected by phone? Oh! That is the matter. It’s a phone – at least in name – and we want to know what’s going on with it.
In fact, it sits in the eye of a perfect storm the verge-Pun. It’s a phone, and we cover it. It’s probably vaporware, and we’re always happy to name products that may never actually exist. This creates a very obvious regulatory problem for the FCC, and we like to point out the opportunities for Brendan Carr to be a dummy. And, yes, it’s about politics – The Verge Covers it. Always is, always will be.
But more than that, it is something that is worth calling out, and worth calling out again and again. In the grand scheme of the Donald Trump administration, a gold Android phone that won’t actually be made in the US is a very small model. But it symbolizes empty promises and naked gifts, baseless claims that they never expect to be called upon. This is an administration that is leading one of the biggest tech industry booms (bubbles?) in decades, that had a tech bro as one of its chief advisors, and that welcomed half of Silicon Valley to the inauguration, and doesn’t know that you can’t make a $500 Android flagship in the United States?
Trump Mobile did not respond to a request for comment for the third consecutive week.