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Daily Mail just posted an article entitled: Donald Trump has been nominated for 2021 Nobel Peace Prize following deal between Israel and the United Arab Emirates.

The article mentions that,

President Donald Trump has been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, just weeks after helping to broker peace between Israel and the United Arab Emirates.

It looks like only the tabloid papers/news that are publishing this information at the moment, so it doesn't really seem to carry much weight.

Has Trump really been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize?

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    So there are multiple sources reporting that one guy claimed that he nominated Trump, which we can't verify because nominations aren't made public for a good 50 years. Call me a textualist but this sounds a lot like an unresolved current affair.
    – Just J for now
    Commented Sep 9, 2020 at 13:33
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    @Jordy: Even if we can't get absolute proof for 50 years, it may be possible to get very convincing evidence. Already, if you doubt the claim, you have to believe that Tybring-Gjedde, who claims to have submitted a nomination, is entitled to submit nominations, and is politically aligned with Trump, is nonetheless lying and didn't actually send it in. It might be possible to find further evidence that he did: e.g. he might publish the text of the nomination, or a statement from someone who saw him put it in an envelope and drop in the mailbox.
    – Nate Eldredge
    Commented Sep 10, 2020 at 3:19
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    @Jordy: Again, it wouldn't positively prove the claim, but it would make its falsity quite implausible.
    – Nate Eldredge
    Commented Sep 10, 2020 at 3:20
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    @Jordy : well, if he happened to actually win it, that would decide this question a lot sooner than 50 years. (It's unlikely to happen though, the Norwegians don't seem to be really fond of him)
    – vsz
    Commented Sep 10, 2020 at 5:41
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    @computercarguy - You are missing the key intent of this site, which is to validate or repudiate notable but possibly questionable claims. Claims made on a random blog or in a tweet by a random user may not be notable. It's the claims made in a widely read news rag, a widely read web page, a highly retweeted post by a notable twitterer -- those have a good chance of being on topic. Notability has nothing to do with veracity. For example, poll results make claims that the earth is flat earth notable (but probably a duplicate).
    – David Hammen
    Commented Sep 10, 2020 at 23:58

4 Answers 4

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Reputable media outlets like the Jerusalem Post, DW, or The Independent have also picked up the story, with an attribution to Fox News which broke the story:

EXCLUSIVE: Just weeks after helping to broker peace between Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), President Trump has been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize.

The nomination submitted by Christian Tybring-Gjedde, a member of the Norwegian Parliament, lauded Trump for his efforts toward resolving protracted conflicts worldwide.

This isn't Trump's first nomination either. The same politician — Christian Tybring-Gjedde of the right-wing Progress Party — nominated Trump in 2019 as well.

Nominations can be created by a large number of people, among them "members of national assemblies and national governments" and "University professors, professors emeriti and associate professors".

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    Members of the Norwegian parliament are slightly more notable than those from other countries since the Nobel Peace Prize winner is selected by a committee chosen by the Norwegian parliament
    – Henry
    Commented Sep 9, 2020 at 10:38
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    To put this into perspective, there were 318 candidates (211 individuals and 107 organizations) for the Nobel Peace Prize for 2020. nobelprize.org - Nomination and selection of Peace Prize Laureates. "The candidates eligible for the Nobel Peace Prize are those persons or organizations nominated by qualified individuals" and like tim said, "members of national assemblies" are qualified to nominate.
    – Georg Patscheider
    Commented Sep 9, 2020 at 12:20
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    Interesting pick of moderation here. That nominations are not usually made public is noteworthy. That this is the second time that a nomination of Trump has been "leaked" (announced, rather) is factual, and topical.
    – DevSolar
    Commented Sep 9, 2020 at 15:30
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    @DevSolar That reasonably relevant factoid was tainted with your political opinion. We're not soft on that stuff here. Your comment and another were flagged as political, and I agreed and deleted.
    – user11643
    Commented Sep 9, 2020 at 15:41
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    @matt_black I see your point, but regarding a) why would Tybring-Gjedde claim to have nominated Trump without actually nominating him (given that he actually can nominate him)? I think the simplest explanation is that he actually did it. b) I think my last paragraph touched on this (without going too much off-topic).
    – tim
    Commented Sep 10, 2020 at 12:05
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It's impossible to know for certain. As the Nobel Peace Prize website says, the names of those who were nominated but did not win are kept secret for 50 years after nomination. Someone may say that they've nominated Trump, but there's no way to verify it.

The person who claims to have nominated Trump, Christian Tybring-Gjedde, is a qualified nominator (under the "members of national assemblies" criterion), so it's reasonable to expect that he's telling the truth.

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  • Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. Please feel free to continue your discussion there.
    – user11643
    Commented Sep 11, 2020 at 23:13
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It's entirely possible that he has been, particularly with this individual standing up and stating that they had.

The fact that this particular person is eligible to nominate him begs the question - is that meaningful? If not, this could account for it only showing up in tabloid publications, currently, even if true.

It looks like any elected representative of any government, as well as appointed members of any government, as well as any university professor or former professor across a wide range of specific disciplines, as well as members of types of NGOs can nominate. The pool of people who are eligible to submit a nomination probably runs in the hundreds of thousands (there are over 46K elected representatives in the world, for starters)

Qualified nominators Revised September 2016

According to the statutes of the Nobel Foundation, a nomination is considered valid if it is submitted by a person who falls within one of the following categories:

  • Members of national assemblies and national governments (cabinet members/ministers) of sovereign states as well as current heads of states
  • Members of The International Court of Justice in The Hague and The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague
  • Members of l’Institut de Droit International
  • Members of the international board of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
  • University professors, professors emeriti and associate professors of history, social sciences, law, philosophy, theology, and religion; university rectors and university directors (or their equivalents); directors of peace research institutes and foreign policy institutes
  • Persons who have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
  • Members of the main board of directors or its equivalent of organizations that have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
  • Current and former members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee (proposals by current members of the Committee to be submitted no later than at the first meeting of the Committee after 1 February)
  • Former advisers to the Norwegian Nobel Committee

Unless otherwise stated the term members shall be understood as current (sitting) members.

The Nobel Prize: Nomination and selection of Peace Prize Laureates

If Trump wanted to, he could order his Attorney General, or Secretary of Defense (or any other cabinet member) to nominate him, and it would be a legitimate nomination. An outspoken conservative politician doing it to troll liberals doesn't seem to be a difficult proposition to imagine.

Simply getting a nomination, itself, doesn't seem to be all that onerous of a hurdle to clear, nor especially meaningful or significant.

For context, Adolph Hitler was nominated in 1939 (to mock the Prize, itself, I think). Take from that what you will.

The Nobel Prize: Nomination Archive - Peace Prize, 1939

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    "An outspoken conservative politician doing it to troll liberals doesn't seem to be a difficult proposition to imagine." It's far more believable that conservatives believe he's earned it for the recent Middle East negotiations. "Trolling liberals" as a first thought is more suggestive of your biases than reality.
    – user11643
    Commented Sep 14, 2020 at 19:43
  • @fredsbend - "more likely" is subjective. There is an entire issue with denial of facts, science and medicine in the USA largely based on how liberals feel about it. Denial on your part that this is a motivation is part of that denial, as well. The fact that it's this one outspoken Norwegian parliamentarian who made these announcements basically based on "why not?" before anything was ever announced regarding the Middle East calls your "more likely" scenario into question, as well. Also, nowhere do I suggest that legitimate reasons are not possible. I'm pointing to how they are not necessary.
    – PoloHoleSet
    Commented Sep 15, 2020 at 13:38
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EDIT Never mind, didn't check the date. His 2018 nomination was forged, as was his 2017 one. No information on the 2019 one.

Apparently, no:

(NYT link, which means occasional paywall. I'll paste excerpts here)

But a wrinkle in this time-honored process — the peace prize was first awarded in 1901 — emerged on Tuesday, when the committee announced that it had uncovered what appeared to be a forged nomination of President Trump for the prize. The matter has been referred to the Oslo police for investigation.

Moreover, the forgery appears to have occurred twice: Olav Njolstad, the secretary of the five-member committee, said it appeared that a forged nomination of Mr. Trump for the prize was also submitted last year — and was also referred to the police. (The earlier forgery was not disclosed to the public at the time.)

Inspector Rune Skjold, the head of the economic crimes section of the Oslo police, said that investigators had been in touch with the F.B.I. since last fall, which suggests that the forged nominations originated in the United States. He said the police believed that the same perpetrator was behind both forgeries.

Unfortunately, that's where this answer is going to have to end; while the investigation is ongoing, the Committee is not giving out any further details:

Mr. Njolstad declined to provide details or copies of the forged nominations, but he said it was fair to assume that the documents purported to have been from a nominator who — when contacted — said the nominations were not valid.

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