'A revolting slug': what politicians said before Trump got elected
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Version 0 of 1. The more incautious politicians occasionally find themselves backing the wrong horse, a misjudgment that can require a contrite shrug, mumbled apology or act of obeisance. In the case of Donald Trump’s surprise victory, politicians across the globe will be squirming, and probably wishing Google had never been invented. No one will be feeling more awkward than Boris Johnson, the UK foreign secretary. In 2015, as London mayor and with the thought of the foreign secretaryship far from his thoughts, Johnson denounced Trump for suggesting he would impose a complete ban on Muslims entering the US. He also lashed out when the then presidential candidate claimed that there were “no-go areas” in London where police feared for their lives. “I think Donald Trump is clearly out of his mind if he thinks that’s a sensible way to proceed, to ban people going to the United States in that way, or to any country,” said Johnson, confidently. On the claim of “no-go areas”, he added: “I think he’s betraying a quite stupefying ignorance that makes him frankly unfit to hold the office of president of the United States.” And he continued: “I would invite him to come and see the whole of London and take him round the city – except I wouldn’t want to expose any Londoners to any unnecessary risk of meeting Donald Trump.” The only thing that might help him now is that he was equally unflattering to Trump’s rival, Hillary Clinton, saying she looked like “a sadistic nurse in a mental hospital”. Johnson is far from the only one who has been inspired to use colourful language in relation to the US president-elect. In Australia, the New South Wales parliament last month passed a resolution likening Trump to “a revolting slug unfit for public office” as it condemned his “misogynistic, hateful comments” about women and minorities. Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German foreign minister, in early August called Trump “a hate preacher”, adding: “We do not need leaders to make the world more dangerous.” The Italian foreign minister, Paulo Gentiloni, has also put the boot in, saying Trump’s foreign policy was hard to discern, and his views on Nato, isolationism and immigration unacceptable. “Forza Hillary!”, he told a group of Italians in New York in September. His boss – the prime minister, Matteo Renzi – shares his views, saying: “I consider Donald Trump a man who invests a lot in a policy of fear.” The Danish foreign minister, Christian Jensen, is no fan either, saying the American “changes opinions like the rest of us change underwear. With Trump it is like pulling a ticket from a tombola and we draw a lot every morning.” For the Ecuadorian president, Rafael Correa, meanwhile, Trump’s discourse is “so dumb, so basic”. The Mexican president, Enrique Peña Nieto, has gone further still, remarking of Trump’s rhetoric: “That’s the way Mussolini arrived and the way Hitler arrived.” The SNP MP Gavin Newlands may not be a major global player, but is also likely to be off the Trump Christmas card list. He told MPs: “Let’s be clear, Donald Trump is an idiot. I have tried to find different, perhaps more parliamentary adjectives to describe him but none was clear enough. He is an idiot.” |