The road to the 2016 election has seen its fair share of blunders, miscalculations, and poorly worded statements, all captured by an eager news media that’s always on the lookout for political missteps. Here are some of the biggest campaign gaffes of this election cycle so far:
Mar. 2003: In a major goof that will haunt Jeb Bush all along the campaign trail, his brother unilaterally invades Iraq, destabilizing the region indefinitely and vastly increasing the threat of global terror
July 2015: Hillary Clinton’s Spotify playlist contains disturbing contradictions to the iTunes playlist she released for voters in 2007
Aug. 2015: A hot mic picks up every one of Scott Walker’s answers during the first GOP debate
Oct. 2015: Bernie Sanders is forced to walk back parts of his tax plan in the wake of arguments that slow-roasting the 10 richest Americans on a spit and feeding their carcasses to the unemployed would be unfeasible
Oct. 2015: In a highly embarrassing debate performance, John Kasich severely misreads the primary-voting public by appealing to their intelligence and dignity
Nov. 2015: Donald Trump is caught in a blatant lie when he claims he saw Muslims cheering at one of his campaign events
Dec. 2015: A Ben Carson campaign commercial inadvertently includes numerous copyrighted clips from A Bug’s Life
Jan. 2016: Cracks begin to show in Martin O’Malley’s facade as candidate blinks for the first time
Feb. 2016: American people fail to take threat of Donald Trump becoming president seriously in the final month they could have done something about it