MaddowBlog-It took just two days for Trump to put a Trumpy twist on the Olympics
JD Vance said the Olympics are one of the few things that unites the entire country. In hindsight, maybe entire was overstating matters.
JD Vance on Thursday: The Olympics are âone of the few things that unites the entire country.â
Trump on Saturday: Yeah, about that.... www.ms.now/rachel-maddo...
— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2026-02-09T20:27:56.959Z
https://www.ms.now/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/it-took-just-two-days-for-trump-to-put-a-trumpy-twist-on-the-olympics
Shortly after JD Vance arrived in Milan last week, the vice president took the opportunity to tell U.S. athletes participating in the Olympics that the competition
is one of the few things that unites the entire country.....
On Saturday morning, roughly 48 hours after his vice president said the Olympics are one of the few things that unites the entire country, Donald Trump decided to step all over Vances line. MS NOW reported:
President Donald Trump called U.S. Olympian Hunter Hess a real loser Sunday in response to the freestyle skiers Friday remark that representing the United States in the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy is leaving him with mixed emotions. In addition to calling Hess a loser, Trump wrote on social media that the 27-year-old shouldnt have tried out for Team U.S.A.
For good measure, the Republican added in his online statement that he finds it
very hard to root for someone like this.
He was, of course, referring to one of the Olympic athletes from his own country......
And while its true that booing is a common part of sports,
the Olympics tends to inspire at least some modicum of patriotism, with American fans cheering on American athletes representing the United States at the international games.
But Trump didnt quite see it that way.
Two weeks later, after the womens soccer team won a bronze medal match in Tokyo, Trump kept going. I
f our soccer team, headed by a radical group of Leftist Maniacs, wasnt woke, they would have won the Gold Medal instead of the Bronze. Woke means you lose, everything that is woke goes bad, and our soccer team certainly has, he wrote.
The Republican added that he wanted to see athletes who agree with him replace the wokesters in future games.
The Wall Street Journal reported over the weeken
d, It is exceptionally rare for a sitting president of the U.S. to criticize a member of the countrys Olympic team.
Thats true, although with the incumbent president, such norms have been erased.