Foot in Mouth award 2015

Donald Trump

Donald Trump, like Russell Brand last year, was unrivalled in the 2015 Foot in Mouth stakes. He seemed absolutely determined to win, and we were keen to reward such enthusiasm.

Picking a winning quote was difficult. Trump is notoriously generous when it comes to providing memorable nonsense. He once suggested that “the concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” This is standard fare from Trump. Like so many of our Foot in Mouth winners, he rarely lets facts get in the way of self-promotion.

2015, though, was a vintage year for Trump. He seemed to say something daft every few days during his campaign for the Republican Presidential candidacy. But there were standout moments of ill-advised attention-seeking. How about his generalisation that Mexican immigrants are "bringing drugs, they're bringing crime, they're rapists and some, I assume, are good people.”?

After much consideration it’s Trump’s ridicule of Senator John McCain that we’ve chosen as his winning quote. McCain, the proud earner of the Silver Star, Legion of Merit, Distinguished Flying Cross, Bronze Star and Navy Commendation Medal, was imprisoned and repeatedly tortured by the North Vietnamese for five-and-a-half years. He also refused early release, deciding instead to remain with his fellow captives.

He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.

Trump on McCain

Incidentally, Donald Trump avoided the Vietnam draft. He received several student deferments and a medical deferment once he’d graduated.

(Here’s a more rambling example of our Foot in Mouth winner at his wittering worst.)

And actually, we’ve had times where the weather wasn’t working out, so they changed it to extreme weather, and they have all different names, you know, so that it fits the bill. But the problem we have, and if you look at our energy costs, and all of the things that we’re doing to solve a problem that I don’t think in any major fashion exists. I mean, Obama thinks it’s the number one problem of the world today. And I think it’s very low on the list. So I am not a believer, and I will, unless somebody can prove something to me, I believe there’s weather. I believe there’s change, and I believe it goes up and it goes down, and it goes up again. And it changes depending on years and centuries, but I am not a believer, and we have much bigger problems.

Donald Trump on climate change