The numerous celebrities who before last week’s elections threatened to leave the U.S. if Donald Trump became president have a fresh new opportunity to do so: a four-year voyage on board the Villa Vie Odyssey, a luxury cruise ship.
The ship offers not the usual cabins, but “villas” with luxury amenities and includes access to gym facilities, a pickleball court, and a spa; an on-board hospital with health care services; a business center, pool, five bars, and three restaurants with “complementary” [sic] beer and wine.
On Thursday last week—the day after the Trump win—the cruise line announced a new “Skip Forward” package that offers travelers (or, rather, residents) a four-year trip with visits to 140 countries on all seven continents. The base price for one traveler is $255,999 (€240,436) and goes up from there.
While the company doesn’t explicitly mention the election results, it offers a “Midterm Selection” package, which would cost you $150,399 for two years of all-inclusive sailing, potentially giving wealthy Democrats who hope for a change of the guard in Congress in 2026 a temporary respite from the red-dominated United States.
Company CEO Mikael Petterson said they don’t specifically target Democrats but have plenty of “conservative-leaning” travelers as well. “Although the campaign was put together before the results of the election, we feel we have a perfect product for those who said they’d leave the country if XYZ wins the election,” he told Fox Business.
A long list of celebrities ranging from Barbara Streisand and Robert De Niro to Taylor Swift and Beyoncé publicly stated they would leave the U.S. if Trump won—a plan shared by “millions” of other Americans, according to Business Insider. In the celebrity category, as far as we’ve been able to determine, nobody has so far made good on the promise, but Richard Gere has reportedly put his $11-million dollar Connecticut mansion on the market and plans to move to Spain.
In 2016, the Canadian immigration authority’s website crashed due to traffic volume during the U.S. elections. As with that Trump victory, it’s unlikely that the Hollywood crowd will actually choose to emigrate—but should they choose to do so, they might want to make sure they are welcome in their new home countries. United Australia Party Senator Ralph “Deej” Babet encouraged celebrities to leave as promised—as long as they don’t come to his country.
One recommendation for Harris supporters living in fear of what the U.S. will become under a Trump presidency would be to consider immigrating to the Nordic countries. According to Europe Elects, over 90% of the polled in Denmark, Finland, and Sweden would support Harris over Trump. Countries exiled progressives would want to avoid include Hungary, Serbia, Georgia, and Russia, where over 60% of the population would prefer Trump as president.
