Donald Trump’s second term has been packed with controversy, from sweeping tariffs slapped on nearly every country to divisive immigration policies. But amid the serious political drama, one bizarre and petty moment is grabbing headlines again, and it involves Trump, a golf course, and a prank gone viral.
When he’s not issuing executive orders, Trump can often be found on the green at one of his many golf resorts. And while he takes his game seriously, reportedly still a “steady single-digit player” at 78, not everyone is as reverent.
Back in 2016, during the grand reopening of Trump Turnberry in Scotland, comedian and serial prankster Simon Brodkin (a.k.a. Lee Nelson) crashed Trump’s speech in truly absurd fashion. As Trump began speaking, Brodkin scattered swastika-covered golf balls around him and shouted, “Donald, here are the balls you ordered!” before sarcastically apologizing and being swiftly escorted away by police.
Brodkin later revealed that Trump was furious and wanted to press charges, or worse. “Trump wanted to throw the book at me,” the comedian told The Scottish Sun. “Who wants to get waterboarded by the CIA when you can have an Irn Bru in the back of a police van?”
Luckily for Brodkin, Scottish police de-escalated the situation and, rather than charging him, reportedly told Trump’s team that Brodkin had been deported. “They drove me to the airport, put me on a plane to London, and basically made it look like I’d been kicked out of the country,” he said.
This wasn’t Brodkin’s first high-profile stunt. He once joined Manchester City’s warm-up uninvited, stormed Kanye West’s Glastonbury stage in 2015, and threw $600 at FIFA’s Sepp Blatter, joking it was for North Korea’s World Cup bid.
As Brodkin put it in a 2019 interview with Sky, his targets need to hit a certain “sweet spot”: “You want people to pat you on the back and say, ‘That was funny.’” Apparently, Trump didn’t get the joke.
