Donald Trump’s McDonald’s Diet Hasn’t Changed, He Says, amid Questions About His Health. Here’s What He Eats

President Donald Trump’s love for fast food — and McDonald’s in particular — is well-documented. But a new report about his health has resurfaced a claim about his fast food order that may shock some.

On Thursday, Jan. 1, The Wall Street Journal released a lengthy exposé on the president, titled “As Signs of Aging Emerge, Trump Responds With Defiance.” In it, Trump insists he has “perfect health,” refutes recent photos that appear to show him dozing off in meetings, and claims that his often-bruised hands are a result of him taking a higher daily dose of aspirin than doctors recommend.

Tucked towards the end of the report is a small aside about the president’s diet, which Trump said has not changed as he has aged.

The Journal resurfaced an October 2025 podcast interview with Republican National Committee Chairman Joe Gruters, in which he spoke about joining Trump on the campaign trail in 2024 and being shocked by the amount that the president ate.

Gruters recalled that Trump had “hot fries waiting for him from McDonald’s. Then he had a Filet-O-Fish, a Quarter Pounder and a Big Mac.”

Even more startling, the RNC chair said, “I think he combined two of them.”

The high-calorie order aligns with another account of Trump’s love for McDonald’s, which can be found in Let Trump Be Trump, a 2017 book written by two of the president’s former aides, David Bossie and Corey Lewandowski.

In their book, Bossie and Lewandowski recount Trump ordering “two Big Macs, two Filet-O-Fish and a chocolate malted.”

They added, “On Trump Force One, there were four major food groups: McDonald’s, Kentucky Fried Chicken, pizza and Diet Coke.”

While the size of Trump’s McDonald’s order may be shocking, his affinity for the fast food chain may actually be connected to his reputation as a germaphobe. During a February 2016 town hall with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Trump explained that he liked the consistency and reliability of a nationwide chain.

“I’m a very clean person. I like cleanliness,” he said, at the time. “And I think you’re better off going there than someplace that you maybe have no idea where the food is coming from. It’s a certain standard. But I think the food is good.”

Bossie and Lewandowski wrote that, for similar reasons, the Trump campaign plane was also stocked with large amounts of his favorite snacks — Vienna Fingers, Oreos, potato chips and pretzels — because he refused to eat from previously opened packages.

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Trump even took his love for McDonald’s on the campaign trail ahead of the 2024 election. On Oct. 20, 2024, he visited Feasterville-Trevose, Pa., just outside of Philadelphia. There, Trump spent time working the drive-thru line of a local McDonald’s franchise, handing out orders and even making fries.

“It was not that easy, but I got it sort of finally, not the greatest, but I was pouring it in, asking them all sorts of stupid questions, but it was very interesting,” he recounted to a crowd of corporate leaders, franchise owners and other stakeholders at the McDonald’s Impact Summit in Washington, D.C. in November 2025.

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Trump boasted that over “25,000 people” waited in line to see him at the swing state stop, giving him a boost in the final weeks of the campaign.

“So they drive up, like just, they look over. Whoa!… Every one of them, it was, the response was incredible,” he said. “Almost like I knew I was gonna win when I saw that.”

The White House did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment about The Wall Street Journal‘s characterization of the president’s health.