Not that most of you would need telling, but so far Rishi Sunak’s general election campaign has been a joke – or rather, as the Canary’s Hannah Sharland put it, he’s been a:
slimy politician… cosplaying like someone that gives a crap about the general public – because it’s a general election.
But if you were unsure of just how hilarious it is – even the usually tightly-controlled media ops have gone disastrously wrong for the Tories. One in Devon was especially delicious – if you happen to hate the PM.
Sunak: ‘Akshata, I’ve pierced my foot on a spike!’
Sunak has been out on the campaign trail with the air of Alan Partridge at a funeral meets Margo Leadbetter trying to do allotment things on The Good Life
ED: Gen Z: these are both shows you can watch on the black device that sits in the corner of the room you never go in at your parents’ house.
First, we had ‘SNIFF MY BLOOMER, YOU MOTHER’:
Woman on the right has everybody's reaction to Rishi Sunak sniffing a loaf of bread. pic.twitter.com/nDTO2aXpo9
— BladeoftheSun (@BladeoftheS) May 23, 2024
Then, Sunak trying to be like the common people with a £750 quid monogrammed rucksack:
I thought it would be nice to wear my £750 monogrammed backpack when visiting Cornwall – one of the poorest areas of the UK. pic.twitter.com/86VgZFfA27
— Parody Keir Starmer (@Parody_PM) May 29, 2024
And of course, all this from the man who will go down in history as the one who announced the general election in the pouring rain:
Sorry, wrong image:
Of course, if Sunak thinks none of that is washing with the public – then his plan B is to lie. Either lie about Labour’s plans:
Jeez. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak shamelessly tries to terrify a group of workers into voting Conservative by telling them a Labour Government would mean an extra '£2000 for every working family in higher taxes”
IT’S NOT ONLY COMPLETELY UNTRUE IT’S ECONOMICALLY ILLITERATE pic.twitter.com/dI4mdq7YDf
— Peter Stefanovic (@PeterStefanovi2) May 28, 2024
Or lie about his own:
This is getting ridiculous!
Now Prime Minister @RishiSunak is out on the road saying his Government is cutting taxes by £900 for “EVERYONE” in work! It’s completely UNTRUE and he knows it!
RT this if you are not buying this absolute boll****
Call this out @SkyNews @BBCNews! pic.twitter.com/dVKzQKu8z9
— Peter Stefanovic (@PeterStefanovi2) May 29, 2024
Unfortunately for Sunak, nothing – LITERALLY nothing – appears to be working, as an unfortunate media op at a factory showed.
If you didn’t laugh, you’d probably cry
Sunak had once again turned up at some poor fuckers’ workplace where their boss has ordered them to either a) look like they’re living their best life, or b) try at least not to fucking laugh. Of course, this is far easier if said workers are actually Tory plants – like the already infamous ‘Not McVitie’s-Gate‘ incident.
However, this wasn’t the case on Wednesday 29 May – and some wiley lass clearly didn’t read point B, ‘try not to fucking laugh’, on the memo:
🚨 NEW: A worker at Rishi Sunak’s campaign trail laughs after he says he knows “life has been difficult” for people pic.twitter.com/grEnTUr13I
— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) May 29, 2024
X predictably went into a dragging frenzy:
Picture speaks a thousand words: pic.twitter.com/NvAdXUXSlj
— Dr Sarmy™️ 🇵🇸 (@Dr__Sarmy) May 29, 2024
Apparently, Sunak’s ‘heavies’ quickly moved in. Or rather, in the PM’s case his heavies from Oxford Uni’s bridge club:
She laughs and then is swiftly dealt with by a member of the campaign staff. You can see him arriving in this image. Bald, dark sweater, above Rishi's shoulder. He appears out of nowhere & makes sure she's not in shot by standing in front of her. @PolitlcsUK @guardian pic.twitter.com/EpOcgXjYeO
— Paul Couchman – Regency Cook (@TheRegencyCook) May 29, 2024
Meme gold:
Our girl wasn’t just grimacing on that one bit, either. Watch the full clip and she’s literally trolling him throughout:
Of course, the serious point to all this is that the wheels had fallen off the Tory clown car general election campaign even before Sunak had removed his sodden Savile Row suit on 22 May.
General deflection
The Conservative Party is doomed – and the Neo Conservative Party (Labour) on course for victory. As the Canary previously wrote of the former:
We’re not even a week into this election yet, and Sunak is already acting desperately. This time next Sunday, we might be looking back at national service as the most sensible policy proposal he ever had.
But as the Canary’s Rachael Swindon wrote of the latter:
Power without principles. The fastest route to the top is to abandon any sense of morality, and that is why Keir Starmer is seen by the establishment as a safe pair of hands while the Tory party does a bit of soul searching and gets its shit together.
Sunak’s campaign is undeniably cringe/hilarious in equal measure – but what we’ll be left with post-4 July is no laughing matter.
Featured image via the Canary
