Trump and the NFL – why it’s complicated

American football fans never thought they would see the day – the head of the National Football League standing shoulder to shoulder with Donald Trump in the Oval Office.

Trump has frequently traded blows with the NFL since he first became US president in 2017, but he and America’s most popular sports league have been sparring partners for more than 40 years.

Trump’s ‘feud’ with the NFL has involved him testifying against the league and failing, on multiple occasions, to buy a team. It may even have propelled him to the presidency.

When NFL commissioner Roger Goodell joined Trump in May to announce the NFL Draft would be coming to Washington DC for the first time, it seemed Trump had finally made friends with arguably his oldest foe.

Already a real-estate magnate by that point, Trump viewed owning an American football team as a means of building his brand. After attempting to acquire an NFL franchise, a 37-year-old Trump bought the New Jersey Generals in September 1983.

They were founding members of the USFL, which started in the spring of 1983 so did not clash with the NFL. The new league managed to lure top players from the NFL and the college game.

The Generals improved during their two seasons under Trump but lost in the first round of the play-offs in both 1984 and 1985.

However, Trump had made his intentions clear from the outset. He didn’t want the USFL to remain a spring league; he wanted to go directly against the NFL in autumn-winter.

That was not the USFL’s original plan but, in August 1984, Trump convinced team owners to vote on switching to an autumn-winter schedule from 1986.

Then, two months, later the USFL filed an anti-trust lawsuit against the NFL – led by Trump. The case went to trial in May 1986, with the USFL arguing the NFL had conspired to monopolise TV contracts, seeking damages worth $1.7bn (£1.25bn).

Trump hoped it would force a league merger and earn him an NFL franchise. He also envisaged a Trump-branded stadium in Manhattan.

The trial lasted 42 days and a jury found the NFL was an ‘illegal monopoly’. But it rejected the other charges and the USFL was awarded just $3 as the jury felt most of the USFL’s problems were self-inflicted.

The league had built up huge debt and, days after the verdict, it folded.

In a book about the USFL, one of the jurors said Trump “came off as arrogant and unlikeable” in court.

Trump had already attempted to buy the Baltimore Colts, before the NFL franchise relocated to Indianapolis in 1984.

He then turned down the chance to buy the Dallas Cowboys for $50m in 1984 and bought the Generals instead for $9m.

“I feel sorry for the poor guy who is going to buy the Dallas Cowboys,” he told the New York Times.

Jerry Jones became the Cowboys’ owner in 1989. ‘America’s Team’ won three Super Bowls in the ’90s and are now the world’s most valuable sports team at $10.1bn (£7.5bn).

After the USFL’s demise, Trump pulled out of discussions in 1988 to buy the New England Patriots, who have won six Super Bowls under current owner Robert Kraft.

Trump focused on other enterprises, becoming a reality TV star on The Apprentice, until the Buffalo Bills were put up for sale in 2014.

Trump claims he bid $1bn in cash but Terry Pegula, who already owned the NHL’s Buffalo Sabres, ultimately bought the Bills for $1.4bn.

That bidding process was mentioned during the fraud trial that ruled against Trump – who had denied all accusations – in 2024, before his $500m (£372m) penalty was overturned last week.

His former lawyer Michael Cohen used it as an example of how he would inflate Trump’s assets, in that case claiming a net worth of $8bn in a bid to secure a loan to buy the Bills.

Documents also showed Trump declined to provide financial statements to the Bills’ bankers – one of whom testified that, instead, Trump “gave us handouts of the Forbes list of the top-paid entertainers”.

ESPN analyst Stephen A. Smith has repeatedly claimed that before Pegula’s takeover was approved by NFL team owners in October 2014, he received a call from Trump in which he said: “If they screw me over, I am going to show them. I’m going to get them all back. I’m going to run for president.”

It was during Trump’s first presidential run that NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick began taking the knee during America’s national anthem, to protest against racial injustice and police brutality in the US.

Many NFL players followed suit and Trump was a vocal critic, before and after he was elected in November 2016.

During a rally in September 2017, Trump urged fans to boycott games and NFL team owners to sack any players who did not stand for the anthem. He also called for the league to change its rules, regarding both the protests and the game itself.

The following day NFL commissioner Goodell issued a statement, in which he said: “Divisive comments like these demonstrate an unfortunate lack of respect for the NFL.”

Patriots owner Kraft told BBC Sport that Trump’s comments on the anthem protests were “inflammatory and inappropriate”. In a meeting between players and owners in October 2017, Kraft added: “We have a president who will use that as fodder to do his mission, that I don’t feel is in the best interests of America”.

After a team owners’ meeting in the same month, the Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shahid Khan told USA Today that Trump was “trying to soil a league or a brand that he’s jealous of”.

Khan added: “He’s been elected president, where maybe a great goal he had in life to own an NFL team is not very likely, so to make it tougher, or to hurt the league, it’s very calculated.”

Trump said he “would love” to see Kaepernick return to the NFL as it continued to struggle with the anthem issue.

In May 2018, the NFL introduced a new policy giving players the option to stand or stay in the locker room but, in the wake of George Floyd’s death, Goodell admitted the NFL was wrong and encouraged players to peacefully protest.

The tradition of championship teams visiting the White House started long before Trump took office, but now there is far greater attention on who is invited and whether they will attend.

Half of the Patriots team did not travel in 2017, including quarterback Tom Brady, with five of those players citing political objections to Trump.

The following year he revoked an invitation to the Philadelphia Eagles the day before the planned visit, after most of the team said they would not attend.

The Patriots were asked to return in 2019, but both parties were unable to schedule a date, while the Covid pandemic ruled out any chance of the Kansas City Chiefs visiting in 2020.

Three weeks after Trump’s second inauguration in January he watched the Eagles beat the Chiefs, and this time they did visit the White House in April.

Less than half the team attended, quarterback Jalen Hurts among those not present, although a White House official said he and the other absentees had “scheduling conflicts”.

Trump has also invited the Chiefs as they “missed their turn” in 2020, even though only six players remain – and one of them is Travis Kelce, who this week announced his engagement to Taylor Swift.

Trump said he “hated” Swift after she endorsed his rival presidential candidate Kamala Harris last year, and celebrated the singer being booed at this year’s Super Bowl.

After becoming the first sitting president to attend a Super Bowl in February, Trump looked to have achieved a complete turnaround with the NFL when Goodell and the Washington Commanders owner Josh Harris joined him at the White House to announce the US capital would host the 2027 draft.

The news came a week after the Commanders reached an agreement to build a $4bn (£3bn) domed stadium in Washington DC, which Goodell acknowledged would “dramatically” boost the district’s chances of hosting a Super Bowl.

The local council approved the deal in August, but Trump has said he may block those plans if the “Washington ‘Whatevers”” do not “change the name back”. The team won three Super Bowls while known by a name which is considered offensive to Native Americans and was dropped in 2020.

Some say you should never mix sport with politics, but Trump continues to embrace it more than any of his predecessors.

Earlier this month he reintroduced the presidential fitness test to American schools and announced a sports council including high-profile figures such as Goodell and several NFL players, although Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa “didn’t know too much about it” and Philadelphia Eagles running back Saquon Barkley said he had declined his invitation.

Trump now has a choice about how the next phase of his relationship with the NFL plays out.

The league has agreed a multi-billion-dollar deal with ESPN which would see the NFL take a 10% stake in the Disney-owned media company. There are fears Trump will block the deal or follow through on his Washington stadium threat.