Presidential Facepalms Trivia Quiz

Answer: Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon's quote, "I was not lying. I said things that later on seemed to be untrue," came as he was attempting to address the fallout from the Watergate scandal after his presidency. It was made during a 1978 interview, where Nixon tried to explain his actions and defend his integrity.

It perfectly demonstrates Nixon's knack for turning a simple explanation into a philosophical riddle. It's awkward, a little tragic, and undeniably fascinating, which is perhaps an apt description of the man himself.

Answer: Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan made this remark as a joke during a sound check on August 11, 1984, before a scheduled radio address from his vacation retreat in California. It was never meant for public broadcast. However, the joke was picked up by the recording equipment and leaked to the press.

This little joke caused international outrage and domestic controversy, especially since it came at a time of high tension during the Cold War, and briefly stirred up those tensions with Soviet leaders fearing he was in earnest. It remains one of the most notorious examples of a joke gone wrong in American politics.

Answer: Bill Clinton

This famous line was delivered during a grand jury testimony in 1998, as part of the investigation into Bill Clinton's relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. The comment quickly became one of the most ridiculed and dissected phrases in American political history, and a symbol of legal hairsplitting and the slipperiness of political language.

Answer: George H. W. Bush

This unfortunate comment was made during the 1988 presidential campaign, as Bush sought to define himself apart from Ronald Reagan, under whom he had served as vice president. Bush had often been criticized for lacking a strong personal ideology or for being overly cautious and pragmatic, in contrast to Reagan's unwavering conservatism. This statement didn't help.

Answer: George W. Bush

This headscratcher, delivered in La Crosse, Wisconsin on October 18, 2000, was meant to emphasize the importance of families as the foundation of society and the source of national strength. Instead, it became a classic example of George W. Bush's frequent verbal missteps, dubbed by supporters and critics alike as "Bushisms."

Answer: Barrack Obama

This quote came during a town hall meeting in Tampa, Florida, on January 28, 2010. ​The phrasing was... well, unfortunate, essentially stating that the Middle East has been a longstanding issue in itself. Critics poked fun at the phrasing, and it was occasionally used to question Obama's foreign policy depth, but overall, it was treated as a harmless slip.

Answer: Joe Biden

During a campaign event in Texas on March 2, 2020, then-presidential candidate Joe Biden attempted to quote the Declaration of Independence but severely stumbled over his words. This was an attempt to recite the well-known passage: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights." The incident garnered significant attention from both the media and the public.

Answer: Jimmy Carter

In September 1976, during his presidential campaign, Jimmy Carter gave an interview to Playboy magazine that became one of the most famous (or infamous) moments of his run for the White House. Critics debated the wisdom of a presidential candidate discussing such personal topics in an adult magazine, and the media seized upon his remarks, with some arguing that it reflected poor judgment.

Answer: Donald Trump

Donald Trump made this statement during a press briefing on August 10, 2020 during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, making a confused reference to the 1918 influenza pandemic at the end of World War I.

The Spanish flu pandemic occurred in 1918, not 1917, and it coincided with the end of World War I, not World War II, which of course didn't begin until two decades later, in 1939. More broadly, this moment underscored the importance of presidential communication during the pandemic, where factual clarity was seen as vital.

Answer: Gerald Ford

This quote was made on October 6, 1976, during the second presidential debate between incumbent President Gerald Ford and challenger Jimmy Carter. The debate, held at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco, focused on foreign policy. During the discussion, President Ford made the questionable assertion, "There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration", even doubling down when asked for clarification.