Pat McAfee isn’t apologizing for having President Trump on his Veterans Day show.
In case you missed it, ESPN’s Pat McAfee made sure to go all out in celebrating our country’s veterans by airing his show yesterday live from Parris Island – the site of Marine Corps recruit training since 1915.The South Carolina island was the perfect spot for Pat McAfee and his show to shine a light on those have served the country in the past, while also bringing attention to those who are currently serving.
While they were on air, The Pat McAfee Show shared Veterans Day messages from NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred, and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, among others. They also had the privilege of having the President of the United States, Donald Trump, join the show live. The POTUS called into the show and stuck around for a while, and Pat McAfee asked him what Veterans Day meant to him – especially now that he’s the Commander In Chief for a second time.
Here’s what Trump had to say:
“To me, it means taking care of the Veterans, because they’ve taken care of us.”
When The Pat McAfee Show‘s time with Trump came to an end, they thanked the president for taking the time out of his busy schedule to join the show. Then right after, Pat got ahead of the presumed internet firestorm that was headed his way (some might not be happy to tune into McAfee’s show and see an interview with the President) and fired this message at the haters that may or may not have been upset:
“I would like to say, for the immediate people that are gonna be mad about that happening – it’s the President of the United States. It’s Veterans Day. He’s the Commander-in-Chief. Obviously, if we have the opportunity to talk to him, we’re going to. And… he is hilarious.”
Like he predicted, there were a lot of people online that criticized McAfee for “wanting it both ways.”
The former punter and current sports commentator has previously stated that he wishes for sports and politics to stay separate. So when he had the President of the United States on his show, many held that against him.
He tried to get out in front of the backlash (basically seconds after the interview was over), but what he said yesterday wasn’t enough. McAfee returned to the topic on his show today, and doubled down on his stance. The sports show host thinks it’s silly and senseless that people are up in arms about The Pat McAfee Show having the POTUS on for their special, Veterans Day program:
“In my eyes, he’s the leader of the military, and we were celebrating the hell out of Veterans Day. There are people that are certainly not the most happy that that happened. But what I would like to say, every veteran and military person that I talked to was very grateful and thankful that we spotlighted the heroes of America who walk amongst us.
(Those) who are willing to sign a line and go for the United States of America as opposed to anything else. So if you’re against what happened yesterday, I would like to say, you hate the troops. And you should go ahead and swallow that and you can take that to where you want to go.”
I’d imagine that the response that Pat McAfee will get to those comments will be “people can support the troops and not like the President.” But I’ve got to side with Pat on this one… it was Veterans Day and he decided to have the president on as a guest. Years ago, that would have been viewed as patriotic. Now, in these divisive, political times… it’s seen as problematic.
Don’t see Pat McAfee issuing an apology about it anytime soon, and I’m sure ESPN just wishes that their popular talking head would cease discussing the matter any further. But… Pat doesn’t answer to ESPN does he. In fact, he runs his own show, books his own guests, decides his own content calendar, and doesn’t need to ask permission from ESPN, Disney, Bob Iger or… anybody.
‘Merica… hell yeah.
