President Donald Trump, 80, told a San Antonio crowd on Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026, that he was “depressed” after a rear view of his head appeared on a giant screen inside the arena, interrupting his own rally to complain that his hair was thinning.
Trump was speaking at the Freeman Coliseum, stumping for Republican Senate nominee Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, who faces Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico on Election Day, Nov. 3.
Partway through his remarks, the president asked the crowd to turn around and watch a video on a screen near the ceiling. The video showed border crossings, which Trump blamed on the Biden administration, and the crowd booed the footage. The same screen then carried a rear view of Trump’s head.
“Wait a minute, wait a minute, I’m not happy right now,” he told supporters.
Touching the back of his head several times, Trump said: “Getting a little bit thin up there, I’m not happy.” He continued: “This is not good news. Now I’m depressed. I said, ‘I look really sharp tonight,’ then I just looked at myself from the back, this is not good.”
Gesturing to the people in front of him, the president asked: “Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell me?” The arena answered with laughter and applause.
An Angel Mom Responds
About five minutes later, Trump invited “Angel Mom” Marie Vega onstage. A White House event for Angel Families in February was one of the occasions where Vega had previously turned out in support of the president.
Her son, Border Patrol agent Javier “Harvey” Vega Jr., a former U.S. Marine, died in an ambush that took place during a family fishing trip in La Feria, Texas, in 2014. Two people in the country illegally carried out the attack during an attempted robbery.
Vega addressed the jumbotron image directly, telling the president not to worry about his thinning hair and assuring him he was still handsome. The crowd cheered, and Trump smiled, pointed her way and thanked her. Vega then turned to her main message, backing the president’s call for tighter border enforcement.
Crowd Size and Protests
The venue had been set up with 6,844 seats for the general public, according to DeAnna Garza, director of booking at the Freeman Coliseum, who added that the event officially sold out. Garza said Trump’s team installed a 40-by-20 video wall in the parking lot, with a livestream for people who could not get inside.
Bo Loudon, a friend of Barron Trump who attended, posted on X on Oct. 8 that the rally “had over 11,700, the max capacity of the Freeman Coliseum!” His figure has not been verified.
A C-SPAN camera panned across empty seats at the top of the arena as Trump spoke. “Who the h*ll fills up an arena like this for a midterm?” the president said.
RNC National Press Secretary Natalie Baldassarre told Newsweek: “The Freeman Coliseum was jam-packed with voters who are excited to support Ken Paxton and Texas Republicans on November 3.”
An audience member and a protester who had booed the president came to blows to start the evening. At least 10 other people were ejected or walked out after heckling him. Demonstrators gathered outside with signs reading “no more detention centers” and “San Antonio fights back.” Trump claimed many of the protesters were paid by enemies of the nation.
Trump urged Texans to pretend he was on the ballot and touted his proposed $5,000 “Trump dividend,” repeating at the rally that the payment to Americans depends on Republicans keeping control of the House and Senate in November’s midterms. He also mocked Talarico, falsely calling him a vegan, and said First Lady Melania Trump had corrected his pronunciation of the word.
Earlier in the week, Trump suggested Iran could “take out” Los Angeles and San Diego, drawing bipartisan backlash. He appeared to try to clarify at the rally, making similar comments on stage and adding: “We’re not going to let that happen.”
The San Antonio stop was Trump’s third trip to Texas in less than a month. He was in Nebraska on Monday, Oct. 5, and Maryland on Tuesday, Oct. 6.
A Closer Senate Race
Republicans are pouring millions into Paxton, and Republican donors who had resisted bankrolling his Senate race for months struck a new tone about helping him, Politico reported Oct. 10. Polls show a closer-than-expected race for Paxton in a state that has not elected a Democrat statewide since 1994 and that Trump carried by more than 13 points in 2024.
Audio obtained by Axios on Oct. 7 captured Paxton telling donors and lobbyists in September that the Iran war and high gas prices were hurting his campaign.
On earlier audio published by The New York Times, Paxton discussed Trump’s Dallas midterm convention: “So to be honest with you, the numbers — when we did that convention — it dropped our numbers.” Paxton senior adviser Nick Maddux called it “manipulated nonsense” in a statement.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott did not attend the Oct. 7 rally, citing scheduling conflicts.
Matt Wilson, a political analyst at Southern Methodist University, told Fox 4 Dallas that a Trump visit cuts both ways, saying the president can still fire up the MAGA base and that Republicans need that to match the enthusiasm Democratic voters are showing.
A Recurring Campaign Theme
Trump’s hair keeps coming up on his midterm campaign swing. The jumbo screens at the Republican Midterm Convention in Dallas showed him the back of his head, and he responded by telling that audience he needed to do a little better in the back and that he should not have looked up. The wind had its own say on Sept. 9, when he spoke with reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland before flying to the convention.
Trump used the hair-loss drug finasteride, sold as Propecia, during his first term, though it has not appeared on his medical reports since he returned to office. A portable kit of small hair tufts, matched to his color and applied with paste, is part of the president’s routine, Trump biographer Michael Wolff has claimed on the “Inside Trump’s Head” podcast.
