Trump’s fixation with the Nobel Peace Prize began long before he entered officepublished at 09:38 BST
09:38 BST
Bernd Debusmann Jr
White House reporter
Image source, Get
For US president Donald Trump, winning a Nobel Peace has long been something of an unfulfilled dream – one that he has yet to achieve.
His fixation with the prize began long before he first came to the White House, to the Obama administration.
Trump was ferociously critical of Barack Obama winning the prize early in his term in 2009, repeatedly referring to it as undeserved and “for nothing”.
Trump’s interest in winning his own Nobel prize became more public about halfway through his first term. Following his highly publicised meeting with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, Trump said that “everyone thinks” he deserved the prize.
Matters reached a fever pitch after his return to the White House. Trump often says he has ended “eight” wars – which is widely disputed – and that that fact alone should earn the prize. While he campaigned heavily for it last year, it ultimately went to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Wednesday, Trump seemed to make a last minute push for the prize.
“I don’t know what their decision’s going to be. They have a reputation for maybe not giving it to people like me,” he said. “But whether I get it or not, I have done far more, and I think it would be a great discredit to them.”
Media caption,
Trump tells reporters why he should win Nobel Prize