This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Having previously referred to his former rival as just "some guy" from Utah, Donald Trump has a new nickname for Evan McMullin after a rally in Florida this week.

"In Utah, I had this character that nobody ever saw before, nobody ever heard of him before," Trump said Friday. Someone in the crowd then shouted the independent candidate's name and Trump repeated, "Evan McMuffin ... or something like that."

The rally marks the first time Trump has publicly so much as approximated the candidate's name. During a pre-election interview with Fox News' Bret Baier in October, Trump referred to the candidate as "a puppet of a loser" but never "McMullin."

McMullin was considered a viable contender to win Utah. Early polls placed the independent candidate in the lead at 31 percent, eliciting a response from Trump, who said it would be "devastating" to lose the state and could cost him the election.

Trump won Utah, though, with 45 percent of the vote. He outpaced McMullin, who came in third after Hillary Clinton, by 24 points.

A month after the election, McMullin called on Trump to use his name.

"Seems you're growing obsessed with a guy whose name you still don't have courage to say. Say it, Donald. You can do it," he tweeted on Dec. 8.

McMullin, who previously called the Republican a racist and a misogynist, responded to Trump's "McMuffin" comment Friday on Twitter, playing off of a Vanity Fair piece that called Trump's restaurant possibly "the worst restaurant in America."

McMullin tweeted again Saturday, saying: "Our charming President-elect @realDonaldTrump has a new nickname for me: 'McMuffin.' I like it. Am I now on the hook to reciprocate?"

McMullin previously made the McMuffin joke himself in a Nov. 5 post online, photographed sitting with the breakfast sandwich in hand with running mate Mindy Finn at a McDonald's.

ctanner@sltrib.com

Twitter: @CourtneyLTanner