MAGA to MASGA? Trump signs order to 'make America's showers great again'

United States President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to lift water pressure restrictions on showerheads -- a move the White House said would "make America's showers great again", (MAGSA). The 78-year-old president has long complained about the insufficient water pressure in American bathrooms, which he blames on federal water conservation regulations. 

'Drip, drip, drip' 

"In my case I like to take a nice shower, to take care of my beautiful hair," Trump told reporters as he signed the order in the Oval Office in US capital, Washington, DC.  "I have to stand under the shower for 15 minutes till it gets wet. It comes out drip, drip, drip. It's ridiculous," he added. 

The order directs the energy department to withdraw "radical green" regulations that limit the flow of showerheads to 2.5 gallons of water per minute. 

'A bureaucratic nightmare' 

Taking a dig on former US presidents and Democratic leaders Barack Obama and Joe Biden, Trump described the water regulations as "Obama-Biden war on showers." He said the new order "frees Americans from excessive regulations that turned a basic household item into a bureaucratic nightmare." 

Trump has targeted water pressure standards for showerheads, toilets, dishwashers, and several other household appliances since his first presidency, which lasted from 2016 to 2020. 

Consumer and conservation groups have since early viewed that changes in the rules are wasteful and unnecessary. The Appliance Standards Awareness Project shared a factsheet in 2024 in which it said that efficiency standards in the US that had been set more than three decades ago “reduce water waste... save consumers money on their water and energy bills and help protect the environment”. 

The 1992 energy law that Donald Trumps has signed against, limits the showerheads in the US to produce not more than 2.5 gallons (9.5l) of water per minute. The Obama administration redefined showerhead regulations to apply flow rate limits to the entire showerhead, rather than each individual nozzle, for showerheads with multiple nozzles. As Trump’s first term was about to end in 2020, he allowed each nozzle to produce up to 2.5 gallons a minute. But Joe Biden stopped Trump’s rule.