Top 10 Stupidest U.S. Presidents

The presidency is supposed to attract people who are sharp, disciplined, well-spoken, and capable of handling one of the most demanding jobs on Earth. Supposed to. History, however, has not always been kind enough to follow the brochure.

Plenty of presidents have made baffling decisions, mangled public statements, or looked painfully out of their depth once the Oval Office stopped being a campaign prize and started being a workplace. Some were ineffective. Others were unprepared. A few produced moments so embarrassing they practically belong in a museum exhibit titled, Maybe We Should Have Asked One More Follow-Up Question.

Some names on this list are obvious. Others are bound to start arguments, because not everyone defines stupid the same way. Is it bad policy? Awkward speeches? Poor judgment? Refusing advice? Marching confidently into disaster like the disaster had a welcome mat?

However you define it, this list highlights the presidents who, for one reason or another, did not exactly leave Americans marveling at the horsepower under the hood.

1. Donald Trump

   

   Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946, in Queens, New York) is an American businessman, television personality, politician, and the 45th and 47th President of the United States.

   Born and raised in Queens, New York City, Donald J. Trump received an economics degree from the Wharton School of the... read more

   I never thought the American people would allow the election of this human abomination. Only people without culture or history would allow someone to represent them who demonstrates only envy, lack of compassion, lack of respect for their fellow human beings, and the brain IQ of a chicken. I've lost all respect for the USA. It's a shame.

   Arrogance and underestimating others while overestimating his own intelligence is not a good combo. History will be severe with this guy.

   I'm not surprised that this mentally ill, poor excuse for a human being is doing so poorly as president. He is our first president with significant mental health challenges. He does and says things that only an idiot might say and is proud, filled with a self-indulgent fake superiority and intelligence as only he can explain.

   He brags about "tapes" and impedes both constitutional and unconstitutional laws, just as other famous past presidents (Richard Nixon) have done, and met their Watergate. He hasn't even learned that he might just be a "Crook" as well as an "Idiot". He should stop before he causes harm to himself or others by mistake. He might as well make himself the head of his own investigation.

2. George W. Bush

   

   George Walker Bush is an American politician and businessman born on July 6, 1946. He served as the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009 and previously as the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000. He is the eldest son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara... read more

   Before Trump, he was remembered as the most inept President the US ever had. His only accomplishment was making the Republican Party praise Reagan.

   Due to familial ties to big oil, he took common sense data that everyone agreed validated climate change and turned it into a political issue that ended up setting us behind in the energy race due to our refusal to explore alternative energy.

   Probably the least intellectually capable individual ever to hold the office. His instincts led his actions, and his instincts were horrible.

3. Barack Obama

   

   Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) served as the 44th President of the United States from 2009 to 2017, becoming the first African-American to hold the office. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as a U.S. Senator from Illinois (2005 to 2008) and as an Illinois state senator... read more

   Now the USA is making decisions we can't. What we should do is team up with Ukraine and help them with their fight with Russia. Well, the fight hasn't started yet, but it will after that plane crash. Obama is too scared to make that decision.

   What he wants to do is make the Marine Corps into the Navy, which, by the way, is not his decision, and to think about it, he is taking high-ranked Marines and making them lower ranks. So, all our military leaders should make the decision to abandon Obama and make their own decisions.

   Horrible president in every conceivable way. I wish there was something good to say about him...

   He promised change for the better, and now we are spiraling down with no hope of a single issue presented being resolved.

   When Obama got into office, I was making over $100k a year. Now, I struggle to make $30k and am on the verge of applying for welfare. 2013 has been the worst year yet for my now 1-man business.

   Without argument, Obama is the worst president ever.

4. Herbert Hoover

   

   Herbert Clark Hoover was an American engineer, businessman, and politician who served as the 31st President of the United States from 1929 to 1933. His presidency coincided with the onset of the Great Depression, during which he implemented economic measures that were widely criticized for being ineffective... read more

   Honestly, I pity Hoover. I'm not a Republican, but I think he was not half as bad a president as people make him out to be. He did not cause the depression.

   Indeed, I have to say, his politics were misguided, as non-intervention cannot solve a huge crisis, nor can it solve any crisis. So not too smooth to do that. But saying he caused the depression is excessive. Definitely not the worst president.

   A businessman who was president during the Depression. Oh wow, the next businessman to be president, and there's a global depression. I'm sure it's a coincidence.

5. Warren G. Harding

   

   Warren Gamaliel Harding (November 2, 1865 - August 2, 1923) was the 29th President of the United States. He served from March 4, 1921, until his death in office on August 2, 1923. Harding's presidency is often remembered for its economic initiatives and several scandals involving members of his administration... read more

   It was said that he was an awful college student, but he was a good speaker. Words don't mean much if you don't put them into action.

   He gave government jobs to his crooked friends. He only won because he was good looking.

6. Richard Nixon

   

   Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 until his resignation in 1974. He is the only U.S. president to have resigned from office. Nixon had previously served as the 36th Vice President from 1953 to 1961, and prior to that, as a U.S. Representative and Senator... read more

   It is highly probable that Richard Nixon manipulated the 13th Amendment of the Constitution in order to incarcerate black people. He would have been responsible for the crack epidemic in ghettos during his terms of office. And even if this is no more than a concluded conspiracy, what does it tell you about his character? He was also involved in the infamous Watergate scandal, so I certainly wouldn't put it past him.

   A professed racist, corrupt leader, and paranoid man who put party over politics and crapped on the US Constitution.

7. James Buchanan

   

   James Buchanan Jr. was the 15th President of the United States, serving from 1857 to 1861. He held office immediately before the outbreak of the American Civil War. Buchanan is often criticized for his inability to address the secession crisis effectively.

   James Buchanan somehow managed to be Secretary of State under Polk and then built his way up to the presidency. How the hell does a dumbass like him get into the presidency? His greatest achievement was putting down a fake rebellion.

   Really? How can Harry Truman be considered stupid when he saved one of the top 20 richest countries in the world as our ally? Buchanan said that we need to calm down the South when the North was still angered!

   Here is a thought: send troops to the Southern US.

8. Ulysses S. Grant

   

   Ulysses S. Grant was an American soldier and statesman who served as Commanding General of the Army and as the 18th President of the United States. He led the Union Army to victory during the American Civil War. Grant served two presidential terms from 1869 to 1877 and played a major role in Reconstruction... read more

   When the North and South went to war, Grant wasn't even on the list of the top 100 generals. He was literally the best of the worst that were left. He won often not through intelligent planning but bulldozing through the problem. He was a hammer and the world was a nail.

9. Ronald Reagan

   

   Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 - June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th President of the United States from 1981 to 1989. Prior to his presidency, he served as the 33rd Governor of California from 1967 to 1975 and maintained a career as a Hollywood actor and... read more

   He oversaw the Iran-Contra Affair, the AIDS epidemic, the War on Drugs, and a series of feel-good legislation that did little to help America long term but helped Republicans write a revisionist history.

   Generally, many of the people working with him, however, found him ill-informed, ideologically rigid, inattentive to details, and a poor manager who deferred to others because he couldn't manage well.

   I saw what happened when his "trickle down" economics trickled nowhere. I saw the cuts he made to mental health, and the streets of San Diego were flooded with people talking to themselves and shouting unintelligible things. How ironic that he himself became afflicted with Alzheimer's, and maybe that was his problem while in office.

10. George H. W. Bush

    

    George Herbert Walker Bush (June 12, 1924 - November 30, 2018) was an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States from 1989 to 1993. Before becoming president, he served as the 43rd Vice President under Ronald Reagan from 1981 to 1989. He also held several other major roles... read more

    Bush was a guiding force for Reagan, but his family ties to oil made him make questionable decisions as President that made him seem stupid because they made no sense in the greater scheme beyond a resource grab in the Middle East.

    Cheney did NOT pull the strings for Bush 41. Bush was directly in charge of how to deal with the Soviet Union as it was collapsing.

    If nothing else, he was the father of one of the most stupid presidents to ever breathe.

The Newcomers
11. ?

    Joe Biden

    

    Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who served as the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice president from 2009 to 2017 under President Barack Obama and represented Delaware in the... read more

    This guy graduated near bottom of his class from both colleges he went to, and on top of that he clearly isn't mentally sound. The guy is literally starting to suffer from symptoms of dementia.

    He has a lot of baggage, and based on many past interviews, he is a horrible politician.

    Now, he kowtows to people who hate America. I pity him: he was forced into this role when he should have retired. He may not live through his term due to his physical and mental limitations.

    I wish him well, regardless.

    How is this clown ranked #22? I mean, he's said so many things that make absolutely no sense. I could flood this comment with so many blatant lies and dumb statements he's made. Are you curious? Look up "dumbest things Biden has said."

12. ?

    Martin Van Buren

    

    Martin Van Buren was an American statesman who served as the eighth President of the United States from 1837 to 1841. He was a key organizer of the Democratic Party and previously served as Vice President under Andrew Jackson. Van Buren also held positions as Secretary of State and Governor of New York... read more

The Contenders

13. Andrew Johnson

    

    Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. He became president after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, having been vice president at the time. Johnson is known for his clashes with Congress during the Reconstruction era and was the first U.S. president... read more

    Didn't learn to read or write until he was about 17, was a drunk who believed the cure for being drunk was more whiskey, gave his vice presidential speech while intoxicated and did the same thing as previously mentioned, and said that God killed Lincoln so that he could be president.

    He was a drunk. He didn't learn to read and write until he was married!

14. Andrew Jackson

    

    Andrew Jackson was an American statesman who served as the seventh President of the United States from 1829 to 1837.

    He was born near the end of the colonial era, close to the then-unmarked border between North and South Carolina, into a recently immigrated Scots-Irish farming family of relatively... read more

    Why is he on our money?! He literally committed mass genocide.

    He had no education and couldn't even spell his name.

    His name should have been Andrew Jackass.

15. Jimmy Carter

    

    James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician and author who served as the 39th President of the United States from 1977 to 1981. In 2002, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the Carter Center. He is the longest-lived president in U.S. history.

    Jimmy Carter was about as interesting as watching rust grow. He also got a number of men killed in a failed attempt to rescue the hostages in Iran, who were taken because he was such a noodle. He gave the Panama Canal back so some other power could walk in and control it.

    Called the energy crisis the "Moral Equivalent Of War," the acronym for which is "MEOW," the sound a cat makes. Botched the rescue operation in Iran for lack of a single helicopter when the U.S. military had 5,000 in its inventory at the time.

    He let us down with the Iran scandal. How dare any nation hold 52 of our people hostage? We should have bombed them to hell and back in 52 different cities.

16. Bill Clinton

    

    William Jefferson Clinton (born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Before that, he was Governor of Arkansas. As a Democrat aligned with the "New Democrat" centrist movement, he enacted policies reflecting a "Third Way" governance... read more

    Wow, what can I say that hasn't already been scribbled on a bathroom stall wall on Epstein Island? Trash. Utter trash. Still can't understand how a man like him could cheat on a woman like Hillary. One would think that they were the perfect godless couple who enjoyed long walks through the decay they leave in their wake, or leisurely vacations in cemeteries where they can embrace the full essence of death.

    Slick Willie is simply pathetic. He was more interested in chasing skirts than the welfare of his country. Plus, one of the most unhealthy things a person could do is become a friend of Bill and Hillary. They have an inordinate amount of deceased friends.

17. William Henry Harrison

    

    William Henry Harrison was an American statesman who served as the 9th President of the United States from March 4, 1841, until his death on April 4, 1841. He died of pneumonia, reportedly after being exposed to cold weather during his unusually long inaugural address. His time in office remains the... read more

    Certainly the dumbest. He didn't take his mother's advice to put on a coat or stay inside by the fire.

    All he did was give an hour-long speech in a blizzard without a jacket, then died from a cold.

    What? We don't know much about William Harrison's presidency.

18. James Monroe

    

    James Monroe was an American statesman and Founding Father who served as the fifth President of the United States from 1817 to 1825. He is best known for the Monroe Doctrine, a cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy. Monroe also served as a diplomat and governor of Virginia.

19. Gerald Ford

    

    Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. was an American politician who served as the 38th President of the United States from August 9, 1974, to January 20, 1977. He assumed the presidency following Richard Nixon's resignation and is the only person to have served as both vice president and president without being elected... read more

    He wasn't corrupt or disastrous, just dumb. His presidency was defined by controversy, economic failure, and political missteps that damaged public trust.

    The only president who was never voted into office. He pardoned Nixon, which is understandable, especially if you consider the corruption associated with the Clintons and the Obamas. But then he turns around, after we lost 58,479 young Americans in Vietnam, and gave amnesty to those who defected to Canada to avoid having to serve their country.

20. John Adams

    

    John Adams was born on October 30, 1735, in Quincy, Massachusetts. He served as the second President of the United States from March 4, 1797, to March 4, 1801. He passed away on July 4, 1826, at the age of 90.

    On the one hand, the attention John Adams received in 1776 was well-deserved. The Boston Massacre was an incredibly important case, and it set arguably the best precedent in legal history: innocent until proven guilty.

    But his presidency was so awful that Alexander Hamilton decided that shooting himself - and the entire Federalist party - in the foot was a better decision than allowing Adams's second term. Adams is also responsible for the Alien and Sedition Acts. This created another precedent. Only this one was anti-immigration. It was grossly discriminatory and bred from malignancy.

21. Zachary Taylor

    

    Zachary Taylor was the 12th President of the United States, serving from March 1849 until his death in July 1850. Before his presidency, Taylor had a long military career as an officer in the United States Army. He rose to the rank of major general and gained national recognition for his leadership during... read more

22. William Howard Taft

    

    William Howard Taft served as the 27th President of the United States and as the tenth Chief Justice of the United States, the only person to have held both offices. He served as President from 1909 to 1913 and was later appointed Chief Justice in 1921, serving until 1930. Taft is remembered for his... read more

    He didn't actually get stuck in a bathtub but he had two other bathtub accidents.

    Got stuck in the bathtub. Enough said.

23. James A. Garfield

    

    James Abram Garfield was the 20th President of the United States. He served from March 4, 1881, until his assassination on September 19, 1881. Garfield was in office for only six months before being fatally shot by Charles J. Guiteau.

    James A. Garfield almost never appears on "worst Presidents" lists, but I needed 10 and he accomplished very little, not because of major failures. His presidency was only about 200 days long, and most of that was spent dying from an assassin's bullet.

24. Harry S. Truman

    

    Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884 - December 26, 1972) was the 33rd President of the United States and an American politician from the Democratic Party.

    Harry S. Truman, in reality, may be the most stupid of the bunch. He, just like Hitler, thought he knew more about war than his generals. He was an artillery officer in WW1, so he may have had some idea, but nothing by comparison to his generals.

    In order to prove his idiocy, he fired McArthur during Korea, more over a personality clash than anything else. Yes, the general threatened the Chinese with the bomb, but that was more bluff than anything else. It was also something MacArthur couldn't have done without the government behind him.

25. James K. Polk

    

    James Knox Polk was the 11th President of the United States, serving from 1845 to 1849. Prior to his presidency, he served as Speaker of the House of Representatives from 1835 to 1839 and as Governor of Tennessee from 1839 to 1841. He is noted for overseeing the expansion of the United States through... read more

26. Woodrow Wilson

    

    Thomas Woodrow Wilson was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th President of the United States from 1913 to 1921. Born in Staunton, Virginia, he spent his early years in Augusta, Georgia, and Columbia, South Carolina. Before his presidency, he served as president of Princeton University... read more

    Wilson was the first president I can think of that began to control what was taught in school. Any time the government gets involved in education, they're going to screw it up. This was probably the beginning of dumbing down America.

    Keynesian Economics and Central Banking are signs of low intelligence, as are traditionalist ideologies. He was, to be blunt, a statist.

    Sold out the country by signing the Federal Reserve Act. His deathbed regret was, Oh my God, what did I do?

27. Abraham Lincoln

    

    Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation through the American Civil War and succeeded in preserving the Union, abolishing slavery, bolstering... read more

    We need higher tariffs. How else can we afford to burn Atlanta and all those other Southern towns now that I've been reelected? No way anyone is angry enough to shoot us!