Donald Trump on Friday acknowledged that Melania Trump “hates” when he performs his signature stiff-armed, fist-pumping dance to the Village People‘s “YMCA” at his rallies and other events. He then proceeded to bust a few moves to the 1978 disco hit.

Trump, speaking to a crowd at Florida’s The Villages retirement community Friday evening, said his wife “hates when I dance to what’s sometimes referred to as ‘the gay national anthem,’ you know that,” adding about “YMCA”: “We love that song.”

“She goes, ‘Darling, please’ — you know, she’s a very elegant woman — she goes, ‘Darling, please don’t dance. It’s not presidential,’” Trump said (watch via C-SPAN). At the end of his talk, Trump broke into a “YMCA” routine, adding a golf swing for good measure.

In 2024, over the course of his U.S. presidential campaign run, Trump ended more than 110 rallies with his “YMCA” dance as he exited the stage, according to ABC News. 

According to the lyrics annotation on Genius, “YMCA” is “about gay men having sex in the YMCA…. When they sing ‘many ways to have a good time’ followed by ‘it’s fun to stay at the YMCA,’ the implication is to have a good time with other young men in the boarding house.”

In an interview with Fox News in January, Melania Trump told Jesse Watters, “I like it at certain times. Some days it’s not appropriate, and I told him so. But it’s his dance and I think people love it.” She added that she performed the YMCA dance herself at Trump’s inauguration, but “it’s different than his.”

In 2023, the Village People’s manager, Karen Willis, sent a cease-and-desist letter to Trump demanding that he stop playing “YMCA,” “Macho Man,” “In the Navy” and “Go West” at his public events. Needless to say, Trump did not cease or desist.

Then in January 2025, an incarnation of the Village People, including lead singer Victor Willis, performed “YMCA” at several Trump inaugural events. “We know this won’t make some of you happy to hear however we believe that music is to be performed without regard to politics,” the group said in January. “Our song Y.M.C.A. is a global anthem that hopefully helps bring the country together after a tumultuous and divided campaign where our preferred candidate lost. Therefore, we believe it’s now time to bring the country together with music which is why VILLAGE PEOPLE will be performing at various events as part of the 2025 Inauguration of Donald J. Trump.”

The week before the inauguration, former band member Jim Newman claimed in an Instagram post that the original Village People “would never, ever perform at Trump rally,” saying Newman said. “We would never give him the right to use those songs, and we would never slap the face of the strong, especially gay audience, that made us who we are today,” he said.