Donald Trump nominated for Nobel Peace Prize — now has the same odds of winning as Bill Gates
Last Updated: Sept. 9, 2020 at 10:32 a.m. ET
By Shawn Langlois, MarketWatch
President Donald Trump began the week as a 100-to-1 longshot to take home this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, but his odds improved dramatically after he was nominated for the award by a right-wing, anti-immigration lawmaker in Norway.
The Progress Party’s Christian Tybring-Gjedde, in an interview on Fox News, cited the peace deal brokered by the U.S. between Israel and the UAE as the reason for the nomination.
“For his merit, I think he has done more trying to create peace between nations than most other Peace Prize nominees,” Tybring-Gjedde said.
With that, online bookie Betfair said that Trump went from a dark horse to a tie with Microsoft MSFT, 4.44% co-founder Bill Gates, who has been a constant media presence during the pandemic, for seventh most likely to win.
“Donald Trump’s shock inclusion has seen the odds of him winning the prize he has craved for so long fall significantly,” Betfair’s Sam Rosbottom said in a statement. “And now in a year where he is an 11/10 shot to win re-election, it’s impossible to rule him out entirely. “
Still, as far as world leaders go, New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern, who has gained praise for her response to the coronavirus outbreak, is far and away the favorite at 5-to-1, trailing only the World Health Organization and Greta Thunberg as the odds-on winners.
Here’s the full breakdown:
World Health Organisation: 5/2
Greta Thunberg: 3/1
Jacinda Ardern: 5/1
UNHCR: 12/1
Black Lives Matter: 16/1
Moon Jae-In: 18/1
Donald Trump: 20/1
Bill Gates: 20/1
Julian Assange: 33/1
Vladimir Putin: 33/1
Emmanuel Macron: 35/1
Boris Johnson: 50/1
Joe Biden: 50/1
Michelle Obama: 55/1
Kim Jong-un: 60/1
As you can see, there are some interesting choices. The Norwegian Nobel Committee receives hundreds of nominations each year, many of them serious eyebrow-raisers, from lawmakers, governments officials and academic types.
Of course, the notion of Trump as this year’s winner lit a huge fire on Twitter. Here are just a few of the responses from both sides of the aisle:
https://twitter.com/FlorioGina/status/1303691059801751553https://twitter.com/matthewjdowd/status/1303689985191825408https://twitter.com/PastorDScott/status/1303689076978135041https://twitter.com/LouisPeitzman/status/1303684782879133696https://twitter.com/Hoosiers1986/status/1303688381159878659https://twitter.com/Amy_Siskind/status/1303678370161610752 
Home 
