by Before her memoirs were published, Liz Truss may have spent more days promoting the book than she spent as prime minister.
The Tory MP, who took over from Boris Johnson in the summer of 2022, offered a glimpse into the situation Ten Years to Save the West in a series of television and radio interviews.
Despite some very negative reviews, the promotion seems to have worked as the book rose to the fourth best-selling book on Amazon as of Wednesday morning.
Like her short-lived premiership, the interview round was not entirely smooth sailing.
Here are some of the most memorable moments.
Failure to tackle his own book
Ms Truss did not seem to know which way to go when she promoted the memorial on American television.
Speaking to Fox news about her decision to endorse Donald Trump, she didn’t miss the opportunity for a quick plug.
“This is my new book,” she said, beaming as she held the back cover up to the camera. “I’ll get it up—I’m sorry I’ll get it up, we are,” she said as she struggled. to hold it properly.
She then realized her mistake, flipping it over and revealing the front, but upside down.
Squirming when questioned about the notorious lettuce
The Daily Star infamously named Ms Truss’s brief tenure in Downing Street by comparing her longevity to lettuce.
Although the stunt was widely praised at the time, two years on it seems Miss Truss doesn’t see the funny side.
She claimed it was “pathetic” when BBC News political editor Chris Mason questioned her on Monday.
Mr Mason said: “Your time as prime minister has made the UK an international laughingstock.”
Ms Truss replied: “I don’t think that’s true.”
“But, all the stuff about lived less than the lettuce?” Mr. Mason asked.
“This is just pathetic point scoring, this is the kind of thing that defeats London’s elite,” Ms Truss replied.
‘Buy my book if you want to conquer the free world’
In recent months, Mr Truss has said she is fighting a shadowy global elite, fighting the ‘establishment’, despite the Tory government running the country for the past 14 years.
In a strange video posted on her social media, she claimed that buying a copy would help the free life “win again”.
“If you want to take on the left establishment, if you want conservatives to win again and the world to be free, buy my book,” she said.
Blaming the ‘left’ for its economic failures
Ms Truss – a former Liberal Democrat – claimed she was being “smeared” by those with left-wing political beliefs and blamed her for economic troubles she is “obviously not responsible for”. .
In an interview on LBC, Iain Dale asked her about the turmoil sparked by then-Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget, which prompted the pound to fall to a 37-year low against the dollar.
Ms Truss told the LBC presenter: “I think a lot of the public understand what I was trying to do.”
“But on the left… [are] trying to smear me with economic results… I am clearly not responsible for them.”
The ‘deep state’ is out to get Donald Trump
In an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal, Ms Truss claimed the US economic establishment was “arming against Mr Trump and his economic programme.”
“The state administration undermined Mr Trump’s first term and undermined my tenure as British prime minister, forcing me out of office after 49 days,” she wrote.
“I assumed I would be able to drive through the agenda I was elected on. How wrong I was. My proposed reforms have been undermined by Britain’s opaque bureaucratic state, and Mr Trump will be eyeing the American equivalent if he wins in November.
“The deep state will try to charge him even more than he did in his first term.”
“Too busy” to support Brexit
During the 2016 Brexit referendum, Ms Truss endorsed Remain arguing that it was in the UK’s economic interests. In the years since, she has U-turned and is an ardent Brexiteer.
Speaking again on LBC, Ms Truss said she might have supported a Leave vote if she had “time for more existential thinking”.
Wanting to leave the EU was considered a “far-out fringe position,” she said.
“If I had spent more of my time thinking about it during those years, I might have come to share that opinion… but I was busy as a minister, knee deep in floods and other distractions”.
Refusal to rule out another run as leader of the Tory Party
Ms Truss was appointed prime minister on 6 September 2022 and resigned 45 days later, becoming the shortest-serving Prime Minister in British political history.
Despite this, and widespread criticism for her economic policy, Ms Truss has not ruled out another run for Conservative Party leader.
“It’s never wise to rule anything out in politics, is it?” she told LBC, claiming she had “unfinished business”.
Asked if she would want to return to grassroots politics if the Conservatives lose the upcoming general election, Ms Truss said: “I definitely have unfinished business. Definitely. And I think the Conservative Party has unfinished business.
“I think, if we’re honest with ourselves, we haven’t done enough to reverse Blair’s legacy.”
