Who Was the Worst President Ever?

American History Hit

History Hit

America, History

4.5 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 2 October 2025

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What makes a bad President? Who was the worst of all time? Don is joined by Professor Jeremi Suri, author of The Impossible Presidency and co-host of This Is Democracy.

Next week we'll be looking at who is the best President ever!

Edited by Tim Arstall. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer was Charlotte Long.

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All music from Epidemic Sounds.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Think of shaving cream.
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0:32.6	Well, how exciting is this? It's an American award show. Fancy gowns, tuxedos, trophies.
0:43.3	But hold on, there's something strange, even dreary about this one. No one seems happy at all.
0:50.3	Faces are drawn, eyes darting about, people are avoiding the cameras and microphones and
0:56.7	rushing down the red carpet. And frankly, those gowns and tuxedos, they look bad. This is weird.
1:05.5	But let's go inside. The show's about to begin.
1:09.9	Hello folks. Welcome. Take your seats. It's time to get the show started.
1:16.2	Hey, congratulations. Give yourselves a hand. You're all winners here tonight. Or rather,
1:21.3	you're all losers. It's time to bestow that most ignominious of honor. It's time for the worst president ever in the history of the United States.
1:42.6	Good day and hello. I'm Don Wildman, and this is American History Hit. Way back when, August
1:48.4	2023, to be exact, we embarked on a journey, releasing a biographical episode on our first
1:55.1	president, George Washington, and then on every other president in turn. You can find them all in
2:00.0	chronological order
2:00.9	interspersed within the archive, landing with our 41st Commander-in-Chief, George H.W. Bush.
	...

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