Better than anyone · First term · № 42
'I know more about wind than you do' in the final 2020 debate
“I know more about wind than you do. It's extremely expensive, kills all the birds, it's very intermittent, got a lot of problems.”
- Said
- , Presidential debate with Joe Biden, Belmont University, Nashville
- Subject
- wind power
- Topic
- Energy & environment
- Era
- First term
What the record showed
CBS News' fact check put wind-turbine bird deaths at roughly 234,000 a year versus about 2.4 billion killed by cats and 599 million by building-glass collisions; the Energy Department said turbine kills were less than 0.02 percent of songbird populations. Trump kept the theme up in his second term: in Scotland in July 2025 he called wind 'the worst form of energy, the most expensive form of energy' and 'a con job'; at an August 26, 2025 Cabinet meeting he said, 'I'm trying to have people learn about wind real fast and I think I've done a good job'; and at the July 24, 2026 White House Correspondents' dinner he said, 'I really do know that subject well.' IRENA data cited by Euronews showed wind 53 percent cheaper than the cheapest fossil alternative.
Sources
- Fact check: Trump says wind power 'kills all the birds'
- Trump claims wind energy 'kills all the birds.' Cats and windows are actually much more to blame.
- Presidential Debate at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee
- Trump calls wind energy a 'con job': Here's what the data actually says about his tirade on turbines
- Remarks During a Cabinet Meeting and an Exchange With Reporters (August 26, 2025)
- Remarks at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner