Chatter grows over Trump’s Nobel Peace Prize prospects

WASHINGTON (AP) — Barack Obama won it.

So did Jimmy Carter, Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson.

Now, US President Donald Trump’s supporters are pushing for him to be the next US leader to win the Nobel Peace Prize — a move that’s being met by smirks and eye rolls in Europe, where Trump remains deeply unpopular.

But that’s not stopping a growing list of champions from pushing the Nobel committee to consider Trump for the world’s most coveted diplomatic prize.

“I’ve been talking about this for months,” said Indiana Rep. Luke Messer, touting the success of what he called Trump’s “Twitter diplomacy.”

He’s one of 18 Republican lawmakers who penned a letter to Norwegian Nobel Committee chairman Berit Reiss-Andersen last week to nominate “Trump to receive the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his work to end the Korean War, denuclearize the Korean peninsula, and bring peace to the region.”

As is customary, lawmakers in the Nordic region where the Nobel is awarded refrain from commenting on possible nominees. But in Copenhagen, Denmark there was little appetite for the prospect of a Trump win.

“Trump ... the peace prize? You must be joking,” said Lene Larsen, a 46-year-old accountant before bursting out laughing. “Maybe it should be a sex prize or a prize for being unpopular.”

Hasse Jakupsen, 52, said the prospects of a win were dim.