Donald Trump Attacks Philadelphia Eagles in Presidential Campaign, Reigniting Dislike After Cancelling White House Visit

It really happened! Former POTUS Donald Trump was in Philly on Saturday as part of his 2024 Presidential campaign. He may have wanted to earn some love back from the city of Brotherly Love—after canceling the Eagles’ White House visit to celebrate their first Lombardi trophy six years ago—only to end up dissing the Philadelphia Eagles for being “a little bit” good.

MLFootball shared a clip of Trump going on a tangent about the Eagles. Despite getting a roar from the audience, Trump didn’t stop from doing what he does best: flame his opinion unapologetically. “You used to have good teams. Do you still have good teams here? I don’t know,” said Donald Trump as the room let him know that they were upset.

But this is not the first time Trump had friction with the football team. Back in 2018, the Eagles were invited to visit the White House which is typically a non-political affair. As it turned out, it became quite a political spectacle when a majority of them boycotted to show up in response to Trump’s demands.

Donald Trump may still be holding a grudge against the Eagles after the 2018 incident

A smaller delegation of players offering to attend the event caused the then President to frame the team in the light of being anti-patriotic. On June 5, in Trump’s own words, “The Philadelphia Eagles are unable to come to the White House with their full team to be celebrated tomorrow. They disagree with their president because he insists that they proudly stand for the national anthem, hand on heart, in honor of the great men and women of our military and the people of our country.”

This was followed by the Eagles releasing a statement acknowledging the support shown by their fans. Trump let his dissatisfaction out on X too shortly after, when he wrote, “… Staying in the Locker Room for the playing of our National Anthem is as disrespectful to our country as kneeling. Sorry!”

This came at a time when just a month ago, the NFL instated a policy as a reaction to the commotion over national anthem protests back in 2016 that even got Trump to call out the league in the name of “total disrespect of our heritage.” The policy dictates players to stand—and not kneel—while the anthem is being staged or be given the option to stay in the locker room. Failure to comply with these would lead them to face fines.

The canceled event was replaced with “A Celebration of America,” and the billionaire intended the celebration to be “one that will honor our great country, pay tribute to the heroes who fight to protect it, and loudly and proudly play the National Anthem.”

Team owner Jeffrey Lurie, the then HC Doug Pederson and his wife Jeannie were slated to visit the White House but didn’t end up going. At the time of the controversy, retired safety Malcolm Jenkins and DE Chris Long stated their desires to not attend the event just for a “photo op” as it seemed trivial to them. On the other hand, the Eagles were planning to do some charity work in schools and community centers in the capital, but those plans too came to a halt.

NFLPA stood by the Eagles and released a statement that was nothing short of showing solidarity with its players and the citizens of the United States. “NFL players love their country, support our troops, give back to their communities and strive to make America a better place,” read NFLPA’s post on X.

If history is accounted for, Trump, who won the 2016 elections in Pennsylvania by a narrow margin of 0.72%, Biden’s supporters voted him out in the next term, albeit by a similarly narrow 1.17% margin. With the swing state slated to be the key determiner of who wins the elections this year, it will be interesting to see how effective Trump’s rallies will be in swaying them over back to his side in 2024.