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Louise Thomas
Editor
Liz Truss stormed off stage at an event to promote her book after a banner featuring a lettuce was unfurled behind her as part of a stunt by a campaign group.
The former prime minister, who lasted just 49 days in office, was addressing an audience in Suffolk on Tuesday when the banner, emblazoned with the vegetable and carrying the words “I crashed the economy”, was unveiled.
The stunt was a reference to the challenge set by the Daily Star newspaper in October 2022 to see if Ms Truss’s premiership could outlast the shelf life of a head of iceberg lettuce.
The salad leaves lasted longer than the Tory prime minister’s government, which collapsed in the wake of a largely unfunded mini-budget which caused mortgages across the UK to skyrocket.
A video of the prank this week shows Ms Truss saying: “I support Trump and I want him to win... But the, it’s what I was saying about incumbents, I think the average American is not doing well.”
Unaware of the banner behind her, the former prime minister continued: “I think it was Bill Clinton’s adviser who said ‘it’s the economy stupid’, so I think that he will probably win.”
Ms Truss appeared to be visibly irritated by the prank, saying “that’s not funny”, before collecting her belongings and leaving the stage.
Political campaign group Led by Donkeys claimed credit for the stunt, posting a video to social media with the caption: “Liz Truss is on a pro-Trump speaking tour. So we dropped a strategically-positioned remote-controlled lettuce banner.”
The same group conducted a similar stunt earlier this year, disrupting a speech by Reform UK leader Nigel Farage using a remote-controlled banner with a picture of the Russian president which read, “I heart Putin”.
Ms Truss has been contacted for comment.
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