Political flapping and voicing of coronal stops

Trader Joe? pic.twitter.com/ICvLmuAoHT

— mass ave curmudgeon (@mass_ave) May 26, 2022

In most varieties of American English, coronal stops (/t/, /d/, /n/) that are not in the onset of stressed syllables are generally realized as ballistic "taps". And in these contexts, lexical (or historical) /t/ also loses its voicelessness.

So for most of us, traitor and trader are homophones.

But I wonder whether the slogan writer has confused the words as well as their spelling. An American who has encountered traitor mainly in speaking might well hear it as a figurative meaning of trader.

Extensions of trader in similar directions have happened before, among British speakers lacking the American homophony with traitor. The OED's entry for trader includes these senses and (sampled) citations:

1. b. In extended use. A person who deals in something abstract or immaterial, or who is occupied or concerned with something.

1613 H. Greenwood Treat. Day of Iudgem. (new ed.) sig. G4v Those that..eschew not the company of traders in iniquity. 1800 S. T. Coleridge tr. F. Schiller Piccolomini i. x. 42 That ancient trader In contraband negociations. 1889 Forum July 512 A mere trader in mendacity.

2. slang. A prostitute; (later also in somewhat weakened use) a woman who is regarded as immoral or promiscuous. Obsolete.

1615 R. Brathwait Strappado Ep. Ded. sig. A7 To all..Vshers, Panders, Suburbes Traders, Cockneies that haue manie fathers. 1693 Humours & Conversat. Town 39 I mean not Common Women, that live by Fornication, publick Traders. 1760 S. Foote Minor i. 44 Tip him an old trader, and give her to the knight. 1850 C. Dickens David Copperfield l. 511 Ha, ha! The liars that these traders are!