Tom Tugendhat changed his campaign slogan shortly after launching his leadership bid with one which spelt out “TURD”.
The Tory MP for Tonbridge revealed his ambitions to lead the Conservative Party on Wednesday.
But, as noticed by outlet Guido Fawkes, there was a word hidden within the slogan on his leadership website.
The slogan read:
“Together we can,
“Unite the party.
“Rebuild trust.
“Defeat Labour.”
It has since been changed from “TURD” to “TURW”:
“Together we can,
“Unite the party.
“Rebuild trust.
“Win back the country.”
The slip-up came shortly after Tugendhat claimed he would be a Tory leader with “no games” and “no gimmicks”.
Tom Tugendhat changes his slogan for the Conservative leadership contest after realising it spelt out “turd” (2024) pic.twitter.com/Vo09V1TICT
— insane moments in british politics (@PoliticsMoments) July 25, 2024
Unfortunately for Tugendhat, this is not the first time acronyms from his team have rather distracted from his campaign.
He launched a leadership bid in 2022 to replace Boris Johnson – only to end up with a logo which looked like the word “TiT”.
It was later edited to remove the middle white line so it just read “TT”.
fair play to Tom Tugendhat putting being a tit at the centre of his campaign pic.twitter.com/dmbgu31pcN
— dave ❄️ 🥕 🧻 (@mrdavemacleod) July 11, 2022
He also made a speech in front of his own poster which read “a clean start”.
However, he accidentally sat in front of the word “clean” and the letter “s”, subsequently looking like he was posing besides the word “tart”.
He later joked: “Just to be clear, I am a massive fan of Bakewell. Lovely place, lovely tarts. Always happy to champion great British produce.”
The incident was widely compared to the satirical show The Thick of It.
#C4News I don't think Tom The Tart Tugendhat quite thought his poster through.. pic.twitter.com/8bLTDYOHjy
— Great Uncle Bryan (@BCollier2012) July 14, 2022
He was knocked out of that contest and ended up backing Liz Truss, who went on to crash the economy and get kicked out of No.10 within just 49 days.
Tugendhat has since defended that decision, telling Good Morning Britain: “Liz displayed a recklessness that I think surprised all of us.”