Trump Nearly Has a Stroke Trying to Pronounce Names of African Leaders

Donald Trump insulted the presidents of two countries right before signing a peace deal when he introduced the duo as “courageous leaders”—but couldn’t follow the flattery up with the correct pronunciation of their names.

The U.S. president couldn’t wrap his mouth around the name of Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi or Rwandan President Paul Kagame as the trio met in Washington Thursday to advance a peace deal that could cap 30 years of violence between the brother nations.

“I want to thank the two courageous leaders—they are courageous leaders, they really are courageous leaders, great people. President Ja-secky-theh-eh, of the Democratic Republic of the Congo,” Trump wheezed.

He then introduced Kagame, whose name he spilled out as “President Keh-goo-may.”

Tshisekedi’s name is pronounced Chi-sek-ed-dee. Kagame’s is pronounced Kah-gah-may.

Trump opted to fully skirt attempting Tshisekedi’s name when his speech required it a second time, instead referring to him as “president of DRC.”

It’s far from the first time that Trump has butchered a foreign name. Last month, he messed up the pronunciation of Kazakhstan, a decades-long U.S. ally, while seated right next to the country’s president.

During a White House dinner with Central Asian leaders, Trump claimed that “Ka-ZACK-a-stan” had joined the Abraham Accords, adding a syllable and stressing the wrong one in the country’s name while announcing supposedly new diplomatic ties between Kazakhstan (which is actually pronounced Kahz-uck-stan) and Israel.

And in 2017, Trump famously remarked on the nonexistent country of “Nambia” during a conference with African leaders.

But don’t be fooled: Trump does have a knack for language—so long as it’s the version he made up. When English proves too difficult for the president, he frequently turns to his own inventive terms, such as “bigly” (an abbreviation of big league), “ana-nomish” (an attempt to pronounce anonymous), and “covfefe,” which still no one has been able to decipher.