Jimmy Carter trolls Trump at University speech: ‘This crowd is bigger than when Trump spoke here’

While giving the commencement speech at Liberty University in Virginia, former President Jimmy Carter took an opportunity to take a dig at President Trump and his obsession with crowd sizes.

Looking out at the crowd which had around 20,000 graduates, Carter, who is now 93, suggested he can draw a bigger crowd than Trump.

“It’s even bigger — I hate to say this — than it was last year,” Carter said, referring to that fact that Trump previously delivered the school’s commencement speech.

“I don’t know if President Trump would admit that or not,” he quipped.

According to reports, Carter’s joke was received warmly by the crowd at the evangelical Christian school. The school’s president, Jerry Falwell Jr., is an avowed Trump supporter.

Carter’s joke stems from Trump’s former obsession with 2017 news reports that showed his inauguration crowd to be smaller than that of former President Obama’s.

Trump directed his then-White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer to hit back at the reports. During his first White House press briefing, Spicer declared Trump’s inauguration crowd to be the “largest audience to witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe.”

The Washington Post slammed Spicer’s assertion as an outright lie.

According to The Hill, Carter’s speech focused on Christianity, human rights, equality and justice.

“We decide whether we tell the truth or benefit from telling lies. We’re the ones who decide, do I hate or am I filled with love? We’re the ones who decide, do I only think about myself, or do I care for others? We ourselves make these decisions and no one else. There are no limits to our ambition,” he said.

Featured image via Flickr

Sky Palma

Before launching DeadState back in 2012, Sky Palma has been blogging about politics, social issues and religion for over a decade. He lives in Los Angeles and also enjoys Brazilian jiu jitsu, chess, music and art.