In a series of tweets, President Donald Trump urged reporters who have received “Noble Prizes” for work on Russia to give them back.
However, it’s spelled Nobel Prize, and there is no Nobel Prize for journalism (although there is one for literature). Some people assumed that Trump was mixing up the Pulitzer Prizes with the Nobel Prizes. However, Trump later tweeted that he was using sarcasm.
“Does anybody get the meaning of what a so-called Noble (not Nobel) Prize is, especially as it pertains to Reporters and Journalists? Noble is defined as, ‘having or showing fine personal qualities or high moral principles and ideals.’ Does sarcasm ever work?” the president wrote.
Does anybody get the meaning of what a so-called Noble (not Nobel) Prize is, especially as it pertains to Reporters and Journalists? Noble is defined as, “having or showing fine personal qualities or high moral principles and ideals.” Does sarcasm ever work?
The string of tweets began:
I work from early in the morning until late at night, haven’t left the White House in many months (except to launch Hospital Ship Comfort) in order to take care of Trade Deals, Military Rebuilding etc., and then I read a phony story in the failing @nytimes about my work…Lawsuits should be brought against all, including the Fake News Organizations, to rectify this terrible injustice. For all of the great lawyers out there, do we have any takers? When will the Noble Committee Act? Better be fast!
He continued:
When will all of the ‘reporters’ who have received Noble Prizes for their work on Russia, Russia, Russia, only to have been proven totally wrong (and, in fact, it was the other side who committed the crimes), be turning back their cherished ‘Nobles’ so that they can be given….
Trump’s Twitter string concluded:
….to the REAL REPORTERS & JOURNALISTS who got it right. I can give the Committee a very comprehensive list. When will the Noble Committee DEMAND the Prizes back, especially since they were gotten under fraud? The reporters and Lamestream Media knew the truth all along….
Here’s what you need to know:
Journalists Expressed Confusion About What Trump Was Talking About Because the Nobel Prize Doesn’t Have a Category for Journalism
I don’t know of anyone who has won a Noble, or a Nobel, prize for their journalism in the Trump administration.
Many journalists assumed that Trump had to mean the Pulitzer Prize, not the Nobel Prize. Reporters at The New York Times and Washington Post did win previous Pulitzer Prizes for investigations into Russia and the 2016 presidential election.
I’m assuming the president means Pulitzer Prize and not the Nobel Prize…not to mention the misspelling.
Do any Trump supporters want to defend errors like this? I just know if Biden did the same thing they’d be attacking him for it, and they’d be right to!
The Nobel Prize facts page lists these categories for Nobel Prizes:
Physics
Chemistry
Medicine
Literature
Peace
Economic Sciences
In fact, if you google the phrase “Nobel Prize journalism,” you get directed to a page about the Pulitzer Prizes, which are an entirely different honor. “The Pulitzer Prize is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine and online journalism, literature, and musical composition in the United States,” that entry says.
However, the Nobel Prize for literature has gone to journalists in the past. In 2015, Svetlana Alexievich, a Belarusian journalist who writes about life after the Soviet Union, won the Nobel Prize for literature.
Trump previously broached a similar topic in an April coronavirus briefing when he said that New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman should give back her Pulitzer Prize for reporting on Russia.
“I even read a story where Mark Meadows, he’s a tough guy, he was crying. He was crying. It was Maggie Haberman, you know she won a Pulitzer Prize for her coverage of Russia. But she was wrong on Russia. So was everyone else. They should all give back their Pulitzer Prizes,” Trump said before.
He continued, “In fact, it turned out that the crime was committed by the other side. The crime was not committed by this side. It was committed by the other side, a bunch of bad people. You saw the reports coming out over the last two weeks. They got caught. So Maggie Haberman gets a Pulitzer Prize? She’s a third-rate reporter. New York Times. And we put her name up here last week. You saw that. People thought it was a commercial. It wasn’t a commercial. It was like a commercial, but it wasn’t a commercial. It was just clips.”
Memes & Jokes Flew on Twitter Over Trump’s Mention of the Non-Existent Noble Prizes
There aren’t any Noble Prizes, of course, which sent Twitter meme writers into overdrive. “Trump, who never admits he has made a mistake, will establish the brand new Noble Prize tomorrow and will immediately award it to the specific journalists he hates,” wrote one Twitter user.
@realDonaldTrump Do Trump mean dis kind of “Noble”?
Some people defended Trump. “You guys, Trump knows that journalists get the Pulitzer Prize and not the ‘Noble Awards’….he was being sarcastic!!” wrote one woman. Others were less charitable to Trump:
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