As of this afternoon, we can now add “heroin” to the list of relatively simple words President Trump has butchered during public speeches and private meetings. The latest skirmish in the president’s fraught relationship with the spoken word occurred Monday, when Trump traveled to New Orleans to address the American Farm Bureau Federation’s 100th Annual Convention amid the ongoing government shutdown.
Although the speech was supposed to be a platform for Trump to address how the shutdown is affecting the nation’s farmers, he used the time to pitch his proposal for Southern border wall funding, over which he is currently holding the paychecks of 800,000 federal workers hostage.
Part of Trump’s wall pitch involved erroneously blaming immigrants for trafficking drugs over the Southern border. In fact, most illicit substances are smuggled in via ports of entry, meaning a physical barrier between the U.S. and Mexico would do little to block them.
“Vast quantities of lethal narcotics are being smuggled across the border… including meth and cocaine and heroin and fentanyl,” Trump said, managing to pronounce “heroin” correctly on the first try. He didn’t fare as well the second time. Vox reporter Aaron Rupar isolated the moment where something started to slip:
Trump butchers the word “heroin” pic.twitter.com/Yfcok3nBc4
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 14, 2019
Trump had another mush mouth moment when he accidentally invoked the Clintons in a discussion of Jim Chilton, the pro-Trump Arizona rancher who claims that drug cartels are using his Mexico-bordering property as a smuggling route. Trump’s attempt to back out of this Freudian slip was no more graceful:
Trump, slurring, misspeaks and accidentally says “Clintons,” but pretends like he meant to do it all along pic.twitter.com/JCBKl3tRSw
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 14, 2019
“Heroin” and “Chilton” join a list of relatively simple words and names Trump has mangled over the course of his tenure as commander-in-chief, including “anonymous,” “Nepal,” and “Nazi.” Indeed the president seemingly began his day in a bit of a brain fog, tweeting that he was en route “to address the Farm Convention today in Nashville, Tennessee.” He added, “Love our farmers, love Tennessee – a great combination! See you in a little while.” The convention took place in New Orleans, Louisiana, but it’s not first time Trump has appeared to forget where he is on the job.
This morning’s erroneous tweet has since been deleted. You can watch today’s entire batshit address to the Farm Bureau convention below:
