A Timeline of Donald Trump’s Most Insane Insults on the Campaign Trail
By Brenden Gallagher
Last night, Donald Trump faced off with his political rivals in another comical Republican presidential debate. While he spent most of the night under attack from Senator Marco Rubio, who called "The Donald" out on his history of employing illegal immigrants, Trump was still able to throw some verbal haymakers at his opponents. Of course, this shouldn’t surprise anyone who has been following the race so far, as Trump has insulted pretty much everyone else who has crossed his path, from protestors to pundits, from his fellow candidates to the entire immigrant population. He even went at The Pope. If we were to list every insult he's hurled on the campaign trail, we would be here all day. As often as most people eat and drink, Trump finds someone new to make fun of. And it's done nothing but help him in the polls.
We've put together what we consider a representative sample of dozens of times that Trump has insulted his opponents, Democrats, oppressed groups, business leaders, and pretty much anyone else who he decided it was a good idea to go after. He's insulted a lot of people this campaign season, though he still hasn't insulted Kristen Stewart again since he announced. Hey there's still time.
6/16/2015
Trump Announces His Presidential Bid
Target: Mexicans
“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
Target: Barack Obama
“Obamacare really kicks in in 2016. Obama is going to be out playing golf. He might be on one of my courses. I would invite him, I actually would say. I have the best courses in the world, so I’d say, you what, if he wants to— I have one right next to the White House, right on the Potomac. If he’d like to play, that’s fine.”
Target: Ambassadors
“If you don’t have talented people, if you don’t have great leadership, if you don’t have people that know business, not just a political hack that got the job because he made a contribution to a campaign, which is the way all jobs, just about, are gotten, free trade terrible.”
Target: Secretary of State John Kerry
“And we won’t be using a man like Secretary Kerry that has absolutely no concept of negotiation, who’s making a horrible and laughable deal, who’s just being tapped along as they make weapons right now, and then goes into a bicycle race at 72 years old, and falls and breaks his leg. I won’t be doing that. And I promise I will never be in a bicycle race. That I can tell you.”
Trump came out swinging with these and a number of other insults setting the tone for his campaign. He also began the racial fear mongering that has been a hallmark of his time on the trail. The man has been nothing if not consistent.
6/23/15
Target: Jeb Bush
"I can't believe Bush is in first place. This guy can't negotiate his way out of a paper bag. So I'm in second place to Bush? I hate it!"
Well, as you all know, Bush isn’t in first place anymore. However, that hasn’t stopped Trump from continuing to take shots at him.
6/28/15
Target: Immigrants in General
“I'm talking about people that are from all over that are killers and rapists and they're coming into this country.”
In an attempt to clarify comments about Mexican immigrants, Trump went and made things worse.
7/8/15
Target: Hillary Clinton
“Hillary Clinton was the worst Secretary of State in the history of the United States.”
7/16/15
Target: Magician Penn Jillette
Who knew Trump had it out for magicians? Maybe he's just more of a Criss Angel guy.
7/18/15
Target: Sen. John McCain
“He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”
Few things that Trump has said have resulted in a sustained backlash. It seems no matter what he says, his supporters become more adamant and his poll numbers continue to rise. This one touched a nerve, though it didn't affect his standing in the race. Trump himself received four deferments between 1964 and 1968 to avoid military service.
7/21/15
Target: Rick Perry (Former Governor of Texas)
"He put on glasses so people think he's smart. People can see through the glasses."
Trump has since attacked Jeb Bush for no longer wearing glasses, so it's hard to tell where he stands on eyewear.
7/21/15
Target: Lindsay Graham
“You have this guy Lindsey Graham, a total lightweight — here’s a guy, in the private sector, he couldn’t get a job.”
7/21/15
Target: “The Press”
"The press is very dishonest."
8/7/15
Target: Megyn Kelly
"You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes. Blood coming out of her wherever."
Trump said this after Kelly pressed him on misogynistic comments he’s made in the past. When you know you’re in the wrong, why not double down on that wrongness?
8/9/15
Target: Carly Fiorina
8/11/15
Target: Bernie Sanders
“I thought that was disgusting. That showed such weakness, the way he was taken away by two young women. That will never happen with me. I don’t know if I’ll do the fighting myself, or if other people will, but that was a disgrace.”
Trump had this to say about Bernie Sanders after he allowed two women representing the Black Lives Matter movement to air their grievances at one of his rallies. Sanders has since incorporated many concerns of the Black Lives Matter movement into his platform. Trump ... has not.
8/12/15
Target: Rand Paul
"Recently, Rand Paul called me and asked me to play golf. I easily beat him on the golf course and will even more easily beat him now, in the world in the politics.”
9/9/15
Target: Carly Fiorina
"Look at that face! Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?! I mean, she's a woman, and I'm not supposed to say bad things, but really, folks, come on. Are we serious?"
Trump hurled this insult at a television screen once Carly appeared. According to Rolling Stone reporter Paul Solotaroff, the lackeys on his campaign staff immediately began laughing along with him.
9/16/15
Target: Rand Paul
“I never attacked him on his look[s], and believe me, there’s plenty of subject matter right there.”
9/16/15
Target: President Barack Obama
“Somehow [Obama] just doesn’t have courage. There is something missing from our president,”
9/23/15
Target: Hillary Clinton
“Do you know the word ‘shrill’? She can be kind of sha-riiiiiillllll!”
9/23/15
Target: Chris Christie
“That room was hot. I mean, poor Chris Christie!" he said. After some gasps and laughter, Trump said, "No, it's true."
9/25/15
Target: Sen. Marco Rubio
“You have this clown, Marco Rubio, I’ve been so nice to him.”
10/25/15
Target: Ben Carson, Seventh-Day Adventists
“I mean, Seventh-day Adventist, I don’t know about, I just don’t know about.”
Trump broke with his usual character here, making fun of a religion that wasn’t Islam
10/28/15
Target: John Kasich
“This is the man that was a managing general partner at Lehman Brothers, when it went down the tubes, and almost took every one of us with us, including Ben and myself. Because I was there, and I watched what happened, and Lehman Brothers started it all. He was on the board, and he was a managing general partner.”
As you probably guessed, no, Kasich was not on the board of Lehman Brothers. However, it is worth mentioning that Kasich does have ties to Lehman Brothers.
11/2/15
Target: Sen. Marco Rubio
"[Rubio] is the one that sweats the most. He's the youngest but I have never seen any human being sweat like that."
This was one of Trump’s pet talking points last Fall. He mentioned Rubio’s sweat on Bloomberg TV in November, after trotting out the insult on September 23rd, 24th, and on October 5th at various campaign stops.
11/12/15
Target: Ben Carson
"It's in the book that he's got a pathological temper. That's a big problem because you don't cure that. As an example: child molesting. You don't cure these people."
11/12/15
Target: People of Iowa
"How stupid are the people of Iowa?"
The question was, of course, rhetorical.
11/18/15
Target: Heckler at Rally in Worchester, Mass.
"You know, it's amazing. I mentioned food stamps and that guy who's seriously overweight went crazy. He went crazy. It's amazing."
11/22/15
Target: Hillary Clinton
11/25/15
Target: New York Times Reporter Serge F. Kovaleski, Disabled People in General
“Now the poor guy, you ought to see this guy. ‘Ah, I don’t know what I said! I don’t remember!’”
Trump accompanied this remark with crude gestures obviously mocking Kovaleski’s disability.
12/6/15
Target: Oval Office Podium
12/18/15
Target: Jeb Bush
12/22/16
Target: Hillary Clinton
"Everything that's been involved in Hillary has been losses, you take a look. Even her race to Obama, she was going to beat Obama...I don't know who'd be worse. I don't know. How does it get worse? She was going to beat, she was favorite to beat and she got schlonged. She lost, I mean she lost.”
Trump is so colorful with his insults, sometimes he pulls out an obscure word that no one has heard since 1940 that is perfect for making everyone hate him that much more.
1/6/16
Target: Samuel L. Jackson
Shortly after the New Year, Trump took some time away from his campaign to exchange barbs with the Hateful Eight star regarding their golf games.
1/20/16
Target: Jeb Bush
“He can’t fix anything. He’s a low energy person. Low energy people don’t get things fix.”
Wolf Blitzer made Jeb sit through a minute of Trump’s insults while they held on a close-up of him. LOL.
1/22/16
Target: Jeb Bush
1/27/16
Target: Megyn Kelly
2/7/16
Target: Marco Rubio
“So I have him here. I have Marco, honestly Marco was having a hard time. And he's a nice guy, he's a nice guy. I mean, again and again and again. After 3 times, you know I have a very good memory. And after 3 times I said, wait a minute, he said that about 3 minutes ago.”
Trump took this shot at Rubio after his repetitive debate performance became the talk of DC, and led to a sharp slide down the polls in New Hampshire.
2/8/16
Target: Ted Cruz
"Okay, you're not allowed to say and I never expect to hear that from you again. She said -- I never expect to hear that from you again! -- she said: 'He's a pussy.' That's terrible."
With this one, Trump used that old school yard trick of repeating an insult. Hey, he didn’t technically say it! We look forward to later debates when he may finally employ the “I’m rubber, you’re glue” defense.
2/15/16
Target: Ted Cruz
“This guy, Ted Cruz, is the most dishonest guy I think I’ve ever met in politics.”
2/18/16
Target: Pope Francis
“No leader, especially a religious leader, should have the right to question another man’s religion or faith. They are using the Pope as a pawn and they should be ashamed of themselves for doing so, especially when so many lives are involved and when illegal immigration is so rampant.”
This is a small excerpt from a longer statement that Trump issued following the Pope’s proclamation that “A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” while visiting Mexico.
2/25/2016 Target: Marco Rubio
Aside from calling the Florida Senator a "choke artist" Trump has an issue with how much Rubio perspires. In a post debate interview Trump aided concerns about effective Rubio would be in diplomatic affairs because of his sweat issue. Catch it at the 2:44 mark.
Now that he's tackled the Pope and all of the above, he pretty much only has God and his very own supporters left to mock before he alienates the entirety of the world.
Why do we feel like both those insults will happen before election day?