Top 10 Most Embarrassing Sean Spicer Blunders
When you think of President Donald Trump's White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer's best quotes, do you think of the time he called Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Joe? What about the time he insisted President Trump doesn't own a bathrobe? Or what about the time he decided to fight with the media rather than answer whether it was a fence or wall they intended to build on the U.S. border with Mexico? Whichever's your favorite, these are some ridiculous Sean Spicer gaffes. WatchMojo counts down ten of the worst Sean Spicer FAILS.
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Top 10 Most Embarrassing Sean Spicer Blunders
Top 10 Most Embarrassing Diplomatic Blunders
We may love Melissa McCarthy playing him on Saturday Night Live, but the real deal gives us plenty to laugh about too. Welcome to WatchMojo.com and today we’re counting down our picks for the top 10 Sean Spicer blunders. For this list, we’re looking at political gaffes that President Donald Trump’s Press Secretary has made during his first 6 months in office – whether it was inside the White House Press Briefing Room, outside of it, or online.
#10: Fence or Wall?
Is it a wall or is it a fence? More importantly: is it the border wall that Donald Trump promised he would build during his campaign for President? That's what reporters wanted to know when Spicer presented them with pictures of various security perimeter enhancements Congress had just approved for the US border with Mexico in May 2017. Instead of answering the questions, the White House Press Secretary got quite confrontational and kept repeating the official names of the various structures. Sticking to talking points is one thing, but sometimes a simple yes or no answer will do.
#9: Bathrobe
When the New York Times published interviews with anonymous White House sources claiming President Trump spent a good deal of time walking around his official residence in a bathrobe, Spicer didn't just deny the report, he denied the existence of a bathrobe in Trump’s wardrobe and asserted he wouldn’t even wear one. Not only was this a claim that, if true, would mean the President lacks an item of clothing that most people own; it also turned out to be a rather easy assertion to disprove given the fact that Donald Trump had been pictured lounging around in a bathrobe more than once - albeit before he was President.
#8: Green Tie
If you're a public figure that’s frequently the subject of Internet mockery, it's probably a good idea to avoid wearing clothing on TV that’s easy for anyone with technical knowledge to green screen. Sean Spicer made that error in March 2017 when, in an attempt to celebrate St-Patrick's Day, he wore a bright green tie to a press briefing. The response from the Internet was as swift as it was hilarious. This is one time when Spicer drew laughs that had nothing to do with what he was saying.
#7: Joe Trudeau
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Justin Trudeau may try to come across as an average Joe, but that's not his name. Someone should have told Spicer what it really was so that he could avoid this press mishap in February of 2017. Because, following the Canadian Prime Minister’s visits to Washington that winter, the Press Secretary referred to him as “Joe” Trudeau. You could cut Spicer a little slack if he had mispronounced a foreign name he wasn't used to - or even the PM's French last name, for that matter, but “Justin” is pretty much as simple and common as an English name gets.
#6: Upside Down U.S. Flag
Flying the American flag upside down is recognized as a symbol of distress. On a ship, it’s the equivalent of sending out an SOS message. While there are no hard and fast rules about whether it holds the same significance on a person’s jacket, Sean Spicer gave us reason to think about it when he wore his American flag lapel pin upside down during a March 2017 press briefing. While it clearly was an error on Spicer’s part, people can still have fun implying that he was secretly trying to convey that the Trump administration was in some sort of distress. Or that he was a raging fan of House of Cards.
#5: Talking Terrorism
When reporters asked Spicer what President Trump was doing to fight attacks against Muslims in the US in February 2017, he didn’t dodge the question. Instead, he answered a completely different question that he wasn’t asked: what the President was doing to fight terrorist attacks by Muslims. It's possible Spicer just didn't hear the question properly, but some contended that it was unfortunately telling that, when asked about a Muslim issue, he seemingly assumed it was a question about Islamic terrorism.
#4: Phone Hacking
Reporters and pundits usually get their talking points from administration spokespeople. With Spicer, sometimes this is reversed. To back up President Trump’s claim that former President Barack Obama had wiretapped Trump Tower, Spicer didn’t cite any intelligence official who would have been obliged to report any knowledge of phone hacking to the new administration in March 2017. Instead he quoted FOX News pundit and judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano’s claim that Obama got British Intelligence to do his dirty work. This claim that was later rejected by FOX News itself. As you can imagine, in the Briefing Room, this led to one of Spicer’s more heated exchanges with the media.
#3: Hiding in the Bushes
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Traditionally, Press Secretaries dodge reporters’ questions with deflection or clever language. Spicer, on the other hand, sometimes chooses to dodge the reporters altogether. When President Trump fired FBI director James Comey, who’d been investigating his administration for ties to Russia, a group of reporters outside the White House tried to get a comment from Spicer. Instead of answering, the Press Secretary hid from them in what was first reported as “in the bushes.” The Washington Post later clarified his location as being “among bushes”, a distinction lost on the late night comedians who took on the story. Regardless of where exactly he was, the fact that he momentarily disappeared immediately after the news broke is the real gaffe.
#2: Hitler & Chemical Weapons
It's generally not a good idea to bring Hitler into a political debate. But if you do, you need to have your facts straight. Sean Spicer learned that lesson the hard way. When talking about Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in April 2017, the Press Secretary said that even Hitler never used chemical weapons - despite their actual wide use in Nazi gas chambers. When a journalist gave Spicer a chance to walk his statement back, he dug himself a deeper hole by calling concentration camps “Holocaust Centers”. After numerous groups, including the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect, called for his firing, Spicer issued a rare apology. Before we unveil our top pick, here are a few honorable mentions: - Tweeted His Password (Twice) - Barred Journalists from Briefings - The Campaign Manager's ‘Limited’ Role
#1: Inauguration Crowd Sizes
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This is one Trump official who really hit the ground running, or rather, stumbling, in spectacular fashion. In Spicer's very first encounter with the press, there were no questions allowed. Instead, there was just a fiery statement blasting the media for their reporting on inauguration crowd numbers, culminating in the over the top assertion that this was the largest crowd to witness an inauguration, period. This is what prompted another Trump staffer, Kellyanne Conway, to coin the term “alternative facts” in defense of what Spicer had said - and it was the moment that the legend of Spicey was born.
