Boris Johnson Roasts U.S. For Picking ‘Oldest Presidential Candidates’ But Praises Octogenarian ‘Fizz And Spunk’

Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson joked that while the United States is not the “oldest democracy” it certainly offers the “oldest presidential candidates” – commending the country for “proper veneration of the elderly” in picking octogenarians “so full of fizz and spunk” to run the White House.

Johnson was addressing a crowd at the Institute Of Politics And Public Service at Georgetown University when an attendee suggested to him that “the United States is touted as being the oldest and greatest democracy in the world.” It was an assertion that Johnson couldn’t only help correct but one that gave way to a string of musings, including how he’d abandoned his own U.S. citizenship because it was “very expensive.”

Johnson: “I used to be American, by the way. It was a very, very expensive decision I made to be born in New York, as I was. I wanted to be close to my mother at the time. And I eventually had to give up my American citizenship because you guys are so ruthless in the pursuit of tax. Yeah, I mean, you’re all going to be… this to Georgetown, you guys are going to be running the greatest country in the world, the greatest economy in the world in the future, and you’re going to be taking in a huge amount of tax, but you also take it from anybody who’s born in America, and I just couldn’t deal with it. But I want you to know, I’m a massive fan of this country. I don’t think you’re the oldest democracy in the world. I think that is not quite accurate. I mean, I don’t know what you’ve been teaching them, but that doesn’t seem to be. I mean, I think Iceland claims that. We sometimes claim that [in the UK]. You certainly have the oldest presidential candidates currently. Which is a great thing. I mean, congratulations. I like the cream of that. That’s a great thing. That’s a great thing. That’s a wonderful thing, by the way. ‘All you young thrusters, I don’t want you.’ You should have a proper, proper veneration of the elderly in this society. And it’s a wonderful thing that people in their eighth or ninth decade or whatever they are, are so full of fizz and spunk as your presidential candidates. It’s a wonderful thing.”

Watch in full above.