President Donald Trump on Friday did not win the Nobel Peace Prize he has long sought, with the award going to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado.
Trump this year has forcefully lobbied for the prize, claiming to have solved seven to eight wars over the course of this term — though the reality is more complicated. Seven world leaders endorsed him for the prize, according to the White House.
He punctuated that work this week by finalizing the first phase of a peace deal in Gaza, although it is widely assumed that the winner was selected weeks ago.
Machado “has spoken out for judicial independence, human rights, and popular representation” in a time of declining democracy, Nobel Committee Chairman Jørgen Watne Frydnes said. “She has spent years working for the freedom of the Venezuelan people.”
“We live in a world where democracy is in retreat, where more and more authoritarian regimes are challenging norms and resorting to violence,” he added, saying Venezuela is “not unique,” with “rule of law abused by those in control.”
Machado is a fierce critic of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro’s regime and has lived in hiding in Venezuela for the last year.
The prize has loomed large in Trump’s mind; he has frequently brought it up since he returned to the Oval Office. “They will never give me a Nobel Peace Prize,” the president told reporters in February. “It’s too bad. I deserve it, but they will never give it to me.”
He rehashed those concerns Thursday, telling reporters: “I don’t know what they’re going to do, but I know nobody in history has solved eight wars in a period of nine months … They’ll have to do what they do. Whatever they do is fine. I know this: I didn’t do it for that.”
Crowds of tourists braved the icy wind blowing off the Oslofjord to watch the live transmission of the announcement of this year’s winner on screens installed in front the Nobel Peace Center in the city’s waterfront.
After moments of palpable tension in the lead up to the announcement, there was an audible sign of relief and happy cheers when Venezuela’s Machado was revealed as this year’s winner.
“I’m so glad the orange guy didn’t win,” said Ulf Smilowsky, a German tourist watching the live broadcast of the announcement on the screens installed outside Oslo’s Nobel Peace Center. “I think he was the only one who thought he’d win, and I’m glad he didn’t.”
Elliot Roberts, an exchange student from Montana, agreed and said the decision to award this year’s prize to a democracy activist sent a powerful message “back home.”
“I’m glad the Norwegian Nobel Committee resisted the pressure and gave it to someone who truly deserves it at a moment when democracy is under attack around the world.”
Former NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, among others, have speculated that Trump wouldn’t actually be eligible for this year’s prize. Despite the recent movement toward a peace deal in Gaza, nominations for this year’s prize were due 11 days after Trump’s inauguration for a second term.
“If the Middle East peace process will be a success, if the 20-point plan will actually be implemented, and we will see a sustainable long-term peace in the region, that’s an important step. And if, through increased pressure on Putin, he can create peace in Ukraine, I think he would be, and should be, a strong candidate,” he told POLITICO.
The award, which comes with around a $1 million prize, is given annually to a person, group or organization “who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses,” according to the Nobel organization.
Four U.S. presidents and one vice president have won the award, including former Presidents Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter, Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt; and former Vice President Al Gore. Roosevelt was the last Republican president to nab the award, in 1906.
Aitor Hernández-Morales reported from Oslo. Heidi Vogt contributed to this report from Washington.
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