What to Know
Fox News host Jesse Watters is certainly not the first conservative to call President Donald Trump “daddy,” but his recent use of the moniker is still creeping people out. For those who would absolutely not call the president “daddy,” the idea of doing so is quite baffling — and weird on many levels. On one hand, many have argued that it signifies authoritarian control. On the other hand, it also sounds kind of kinky.
The official White House social media accounts have referred to Trump as “daddy” before (which also creeped people out, by the way). And recently, while speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Trump boasted about NATO officials calling him daddy. And while all of these things have bothered Trump critics, Watters’ recent comment sounded especially strange to people.
People who watched the clip on social media wished they hadn’t.
One person on X simply wrote, “Ewwwww” in response to Watters’ recent comment, which might tell you everything you need to know. But Watters made the “gross and disturbing” comment when showing footage of Trump landing in West Palm Beach, Florida. Text shown on screen read, “Daddy’s Coming Home.” Uhh, OK. It gets worse though.
Meanwhile, Watters said, “Daddy’s about to land, and daddy has needs.” Daddy has needs? Needless to say, people were cringing over this. The line left some people basically speechless, with one person writing, “So many ways to respond…” Someone else on X called the comment “embarrassing,” and another person said, “There is something sick and perverse about that.”
The comment went viral.
Fox News:
— Spencer Hakimian (@SpencerHakimian) January 21, 2026
“Daddy is about to land and he has needs.”
pic.twitter.com/M5xy1K8FbD
It also became a topic of discussion on Reddit, and people had questions. “That’s real?” one person questioned. “Wtf was the context? F—ing weirdos.” Someone else said, “What the f— is wrong with these weirdo perverts??” Others thought back to when Democrats like Minnesota Governor Tim Walz called Republicans “weird.” Now, it really seems like an understatement, which is why some people argued that Republicans’ frequent use of the word “daddy” should maybe be incorporated into Democrats’ campaign strategies. “Democrats really need to hammer home how weird it is for grown a– men to keep calling the president Daddy,” another critic suggested.
Trump talked about people calling him “daddy” during his Davos speech.
During his controversial speech at the World Economic Forum, Trump said, “I’m helping NATO, and I’ve — until the last few days, when I told them about Iceland, they loved me. They called me daddy, right?” In June 2025, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte called Trump “daddy,” which Trump seemed pretty happy about.
Per Politico, he later said, “I think he likes me. ‘Daddy, you’re my daddy.’ He did it very affectionately.” Yep, sounds totally normal and not strange at all.
