78 creative ways to be political this Halloween

WASHINGTON POST

8 years ago

Puppets in the likeness of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, left, and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump face-off. (Carlo Allegri/Reuters)

Former President Bill Clinton enjoys the balloon drop after his wife, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, accepted the nomination at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, July 28, 2016. (Lucy Nicholson/Reuters)

Melania Trump. (Patrick Semansky/AP)

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie reacts to a question during a news conference in Trenton, New Jersey, in March 28, 2014. (Eduardo Munoz/Reuters)

Is it just us, or has this whole year been Halloween? We’ve been scared, spooked and binge-eating candy since January already.

Now that the actual holiday is here, just before Election Day, Halloween 2016 has no chance of being a time of blissful escapism. That pant-suited grandma and the pumpkin-tinted reality star are barking at us from every screen — but that doesn’t mean they have to be your Halloween costumes!

So, please throw away those blonde wigs. Stop practicing your pronunciation of “yuuge.” Give your mom her shoulder pads back. If you must don an election-related Halloween costume, please be something else.

Here are a few ideas. You can tell your friends you thought of them yourself. If you win a costume contest with one of our ideas, please send us candy. (If you change your skin tone or something equally stupid to achieve these looks, we disown you.)

1. A basket of deplorables

2. The woman card

3. A sexy undecided voter

4. A 400-pound hacker

5. A Nasty Woman. (How to dress? Pretty sure Destiny’s Child or Janet Jackson have some suggestions for you.)

6. Duo costume: Two puppets yelling at each other, “No, you’re the puppet!”

7. A splinter (the GOP)

8. Jeb’s exclamation point

9. Duo costume: Michelle Obama hugging George Bush

10. Lincoln Chafee (or add Gold Bond for Chafee Lincoln)

11. Ted Cruz, Zodiac Killer

12. Heidi Cruz with a shopping cart full of 100 cans of chunky Campbell’s soup

13. Trump’s tax returns, or just the number 915,729,923

14. Lindsay Graham’s cell phone number

15. Duo costume: Loretta Lynch and Bill Clinton, just chattin’

16. Bill Clinton playing in balloons

17. John Kasich eating a giant sandwich (Bonus: you get to eat a giant sandwich)

18. Chris Christie’s facial expressions

19. Kid costume: Little Marco

20. Vermin Supreme

21. The belt buckle that saved the guy Ben Carson tried to stab

22. (Very large) group costume: All the presidential candidates who lost

23. Trump’s wall

24. Trump’s hair

25. Trump’s locker room

26. Trump Jr.’s Skittles

27. Trump’s Tic Tacs

28. Regretful Joe Biden

29. Hillary’s “damn emails”

30. Hillary’s pan(dering)

31. Huma

32. Anthony Weiner

33. The cloth that wiped Hillary’s server

34. Draft Biden (jersey)

35. “Senioritis” Obama

36. Duo costume: Obama 8 years ago and Obama today

37. Deez Nuts

38. Putin on a horse

39. Little hands

40. Birdie Sanders

41. Billy Bush, job applicant

42. Sarah Palin in that sweater

43. The Red Hat

44. The Harriet Tubman $20 bill

45. Group costume: The USA Freedom Kids

46. A Trump University graduate

47. Woke toddler

48. America’s Dad, Tim Kaine

49. Mike Pence trying to get Trump on the phone

50. Sean Hannity waiting by his phone

51. Rosie O’Donnell

52. CNN countdown clock

53. Group costume: Eight SCOTUS justices and an empty chair

54. Rudy Giuliani

55. Megyn Kelly

56. Flabbergasted pundit

57. Mute Matt Lauer

58. Matt Drudge

59. Group costume: the hosts of late night

60. Taco bowl (“Happy #CincoDeMayo! The best taco bowls are made in Trump Tower Grill. I love Hispanics!”)

61. Hot sauce in her bag

62. Katrina Pierson (requires necklace made of bullets)

63. Tiffany Trump (requires nametag)

64. Melania in “pussy bow”

65. Group costume: The three wives of Donald Trump

66. Duo costume: Chelsea and Ivanka, BFFs

67. The national debt

68. Julian Assange in loungewear

69. Fact checkers who haven’t slept in months

70. Group costume: Four Pinocchios (excellent photobombing potential)

71. David Fahrenthold’s notebooks

72. A small loan of a million dollars

73. Law & Order

74. Merrick Garland, still waiting

75. A super PAC (superhero cape + Pacman costume)

76. The giant meteor that 13 percent of voters are inclined to pick over Trump or Clinton

77. Kanye 2020

78. A founding father rolling in his grave

Beth Butler, Caitlin Dewey, Karen Heller, Maura Judkis, Michelle Ye Hee Lee and Abby Ohlheiser contributed to this “report.”