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Politicians with Other Careers Quiz

These politicians had other careers first. Guess who they are.
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Last updated: November 9, 2016
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First submittedMarch 2, 2011
Times taken13,822
Average score57.9%
Rating3.84
4:00
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Prior career
Political position
Answer
Property developer / reality TV star
U.S. President
Donald Trump
Civil War commanding general
U.S. President
Ulysses S. Grant
WWII general
U.S. President
Dwight Eisenhower
Actor
U.S. President
Ronald Reagan
Baseball team owner
U.S. President
George W. Bush
Peanut farmer
U.S. President
Jimmy Carter
President of Princeton
U.S. President
Woodrow Wilson
Wrestler / actor
Governor of Minnesota
Jesse Ventura
CEO
Governor of Massachusetts
Mitt Romney
Bodybuiler / actor
Governor of California
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Basketball player
New Jersey Senator
Bill Bradley
Comedian
Minnesota Senator
Al Franken
Entrepreneur
Mayor of New York City
Michael Bloomberg
Entrepreneur
Prime Minister of Italy
Silvio Berlusconi
Astronaut
Ohio Senator
John Glenn
First Lady
Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton
Actor / director
Mayor of Carmel, CA
Clint Eastwood
Child actress
Ambassador
Shirley Temple Black
Pop singer
California Congressman
Sonny Bono
+3
Level 78
Mar 2, 2011
You didn't include Gerald Ford, Michigan football coach?

Also, when she was ambassador Shirley Temple's name was Shirley Temple Black.

+4
Level 81
Nov 16, 2016
Ford was a Michigan football player, not coach. He was an assistant coach at Yale very briefly.
+2
Level 27
Jan 30, 2012
Oh man... such people wrote history?
+4
Level 51
Apr 18, 2017
Yeah, horrible. How'd we elect a WWII general and the head of the Union Army to the presidency?!
+2
Level 62
Nov 1, 2012
How about Crazy Cooter (Ben Jones) from Dukes of Hazzard? He served 4 years in the House of Representatives
+2
Level 75
Nov 16, 2016
Fred Thompson was another actor turned senator. (Hunt for Red October, Law & Order, etc.)
+2
Level 67
Jan 4, 2013
Eisenhower was also a University President; he headed Columbia University from 1948 to 1953. And Rutherford B. Hayes and James A. Garfield were both Civil War Generals. You need to be more precise.
+2
Level 82
May 27, 2013
yeah, was thinking the same thing.
+2
Level 50
Aug 25, 2015
Arthur was also a Civil War General. 4 presidents were civil war generals.
+2
Level ∞
Nov 9, 2016
The clues have been improved to remove possibly ambiguities.
+2
Level 86
Feb 5, 2013
Thank you for accepting so many misspellings of "Schwarzenegger." What a messed up name.
+4
Level 78
Nov 22, 2016
I'm just glad I can merely type "Arnold."
+2
Level 82
May 27, 2013
Got 15 of these. Can't believe I missed Romney. But... really... didn't EVERY politician have some other job before/during/while/after they entered politics? It's extremely rare that this is not the case. If you made a quiz on politicians who did not have other careers it would be harder coming up with answers. That said, one famous one who came to mind was Nelson Rockefeller. But really you could put every U.S. president and vice president on this quiz, they all did something.
+2
Level 84
Nov 13, 2016
Yeah, had the same thought, but kudos to QM for making it. It's interesting when you think about it.
+2
Level 64
Nov 20, 2016
There's actually an entry on Wikipedia for Presidents by other (usually elected) jobs.
+3
Level 74
Nov 11, 2017
Unfortunately the worldwide trend is for people to select politics as a career - they start straight out of university working for a union, thinktank, lobby group or as a political staffer with the goal to see how far they can rise in the system (ie. personal ambition before actually fixing or improving something). Trump's election is a reaction against the political classes - hopefully better qualified, less narcissistic candidates will use the same pathway
+3
Level 59
Jan 14, 2014
A little US Centric>
+3
Level ∞
Nov 9, 2016
A lot U.S. centric!
+3
Level 86
Nov 11, 2016
Why not remove Berlusconi and rename the quiz "US politicians etc." ?
+3
Level 82
Nov 16, 2016
Or add some others from overseas perhaps. Manny Pacquiao (boxer) springs to mind. Emperess Theodora or Dowager Emperess Cixi (prostitute/concubine). Or Stalin (seminary student, gangster). Or Hitler (soldier, failed artist).
+2
Level 76
Jun 26, 2014
Can you accept Black as an answer? (Shirley Temple's adult surname)
+2
Level 84
Jun 16, 2015
Agree with other commenters - she was known as Shirley Temple Black for about two-thirds of her life, including all of her political career.
+2
Level 79
Jun 1, 2016
Went through every US president except Wilson.
+2
Level 64
Jun 3, 2016
Wilson was the only US president with a PhD.
+3
Level 76
Nov 16, 2016
I'm a pretty big Clint Eastwood fan, but I never knew he was a mayor
+2
Level 66
Nov 16, 2016
What would that city have looked like when he was done? Crime would probably have been at an all-time low, and firearms salesmen would have done record business.
+1
Level 74
Nov 20, 2016
The firearms sales tend to go up when the liberal president/governor/mayors are in office because they threaten to take the guns away. Otherwise, people don't buy more guns when their representative is pro second amendment.
+1
Level 79
Aug 16, 2023
Source? Seems far-fetched that people are so scared of liberals "taking their guns away" that they would buy more.
+1
Level 85
May 11, 2023
Why do you say "would"? Take a look: What DID the city look like when he was done? Is your theory born out by the statistics or is it refuted?
+2
Level 56
Nov 16, 2016
Manny Pacquiao should have been included, he's done everything!
+2
Level 57
Nov 16, 2016
Shouldn't Trump be updated to "US president" now?
+2
Level 92
Nov 16, 2016
No. President-Elect is the proper term until he takes office on Jan 20, 2017
+2
Level 81
Nov 16, 2016
Technically he is not the President-Elect yet. He lost the popular vote and the electoral college has not yet voted. So no one has elected him. Presumptive President would be better.
+4
Level 81
Nov 16, 2016
You misspelled "con man" for Trump.
+2
Level 59
Nov 16, 2016
A+
+2
Level 58
Nov 16, 2016
Aww, someone's upset about the election.
+2
Level 29
Nov 16, 2016
get over it.
+2
Level 65
Nov 16, 2016
Someone's salty
+2
Level 56
Apr 5, 2023
This aged VERY well
+1
Level 79
Aug 16, 2023
I'm sorry, who's salty about the election now? Hooray for democratic backsliding!
+2
Level 73
Nov 16, 2016
Al Franken is still a comedian.
+1
Level 31
Mar 26, 2018
But no longer a senator. Good riddance.
+2
Level 61
Nov 16, 2016
NBA Hall of Famer Dave Bing was Mayor of Detroit for a while there...not that the quiz needs more people.
+2
Level 81
Nov 16, 2016
Steve Largent would be a good addition. Congressman for 8 years from Oklahoma after being an NFL star and multiple record holder for receiving.
+2
Level ∞
Nov 16, 2016
Steve Largent was on the quiz (as well as some other athletes). Their percentage guessed was low so I removed them.
+2
Level 84
Mar 10, 2017
IMO, you should have left him on. Largent is by no means obscure. He's a Hall of Fame wide receiver for the Seattle Seahawks. Let his presence separate the "men from the boys" on this quiz.
+1
Level 79
Aug 16, 2023
Do you mean literally separate the men from the boys? Seems like most people born in the last 30 years would have never heard of him, let alone know that he was an Oklahoma politician.
+2
Level 51
Nov 16, 2016
Alan Page, Minnesota Vikings defensive lineman - Minnesota state Supreme Court associate justice
+2
Level 82
Nov 16, 2016
Not politician though
+2
Level 44
Nov 18, 2016
Since you included Wilson who had a previous career as an academic, I would suggest including Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. She had a career as a very well known law professor at Rutgers and Harvard prior to being elected as a Senator.
+3
Level 74
Nov 21, 2016
First Lady is not really a career or job; it's just the spouse of the President. If you are going to include Hillary, lawyer would be her job but since she has always been political (even as a lawyer) she does not fit on the list.
+2
Level 59
Sep 8, 2017
Hmm, got 16/19, but could we make it a little US centric?
+2
Level 59
Sep 8, 2017
*less
+2
Level 59
Jan 28, 2018
Bodybuilder not Bodybuiler
+2
Level 37
Apr 7, 2018
I completely forgot that Minnesota had Jesse Ventura as a Governor
+2
Level 52
May 21, 2018
I WISH I could forget he was a Governor.
+3
Level 80
Dec 2, 2020
You can now add college football coach/Alabama senator to this list.
+1
Level 62
Mar 6, 2021
You could add Modi the next time you update this. He used to be a tea seller at an railway station in his childhood.
+2
Level 76
Nov 5, 2022
i know this comments section is inundated with suggestions for additions but i think a really fitting one to make it up to 20 would be volodymyr zelenskyy, former comedian now president of ukraine. i reckon a lot of people would get it and it would make it a less us-centric quiz.
+1
Level 87
Jan 10, 2024
If Berlusconi was an “entrepreneur” then so was Al Capone