Iranian President Says White House Is ‘Afflicted by Mental Retardation’ as Trump Announces Sanctions

The Trump presidency has definitely lowered the bar as far as expectations when it comes to our world leaders and the person sitting in our country’s highest office. Trump alone has managed to destroy the notion that the president of the United States is knowledgeable about the world—including knowing the names of leaders of the countries he has dealings with.

So while it comes as no surprise that he cannot manage to get the names of world leaders straight in his head, it is still disappointing—and embarrassing—when we see it in action.

It becomes even more egregious, however, when other world leaders notice his incompetence and call him out on it.

In response to attacks on two oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman earlier this month as well as the shooting down of an American surveillance drone that Tehran claims violated Iranian airspace, Trump announced Monday that he would be leveling sanctions that “will deny the Supreme Leader and the Supreme Leader’s office and those closely affiliated with him and the office access to key financial resources.”

In his speech, Trump said that the “assets of Ayatollah Khomeini and his office will not be spared from the sanctions.”

It doesn’t help that Ayatollah Khomeini died in 1989, and the current supreme leader of Iran is actually named Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Mispronouncing names aside, Trump is doing a bang up job of escalating tensions with Iran.

Politico reports that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard claimed responsibility last Thursday for shooting down the surveillance drone, but Iranian officials deny involvement in the tanker attacks.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said Trump’s “fruitless sanctions on Iran’s leadership and the chief of Iranian diplomacy” would close the road of diplomacy between Washington and Tehran.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said the White House is “afflicted by mental retardation” and called the sanctions “outrageous and idiotic” according to the Associated Press.

“You sanction the foreign minister simultaneously with a request for talks,” Rouhani said Tuesday. “The White House is afflicted by mental retardation and does not know what to do.”

You said a mouthful, sir.