Donald Trump apparently now has a hype man for his sketchy golf claims.
Brian Jack ― a former Trump adviser who’s running to represent a Georgia district in the House of Representatives, with Trump’s blessing ― told a highly suspect anecdote about his onetime boss on the links.
“I’m not sure if I should say this,” Jack told a Trump rally in Rome, Georgia, on Saturday. “But just a few weeks ago, President Trump put to shame two professional golfers. I ain’t gonna mention their names, but just know he shot a 70 on 18 holes.”
With no other information about the course, the pros Trump allegedly played against, or what concessions the former president might have received, we’ll have to stop short of calling it a lie.
But Mediaite seemed to nail it in saying that Jack’s claim about Trump’s golf skills “might be the most shameless yet.”
One skeptic wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that Jack’s tale had the “same vibes” as a North Korean media report that the late Kim Jong Il made 11 holes-in-one during the first round of golf he ever played. (A more modest report said five holes-in-one.)
Someone else on X pointed to “Commander in Cheat,” Rick Reilly’s 2019 book devoted to Trump’s golf antics. Trump allegedly pulled a fast one even when he played with Tiger Woods, according to Reilly.
“Trump doesn’t just cheat at golf. He cheats like a three-card Monte dealer,” Reilly wrote. “He throws it, boots it, and moves it. He lies about his lies. He fudges and foozles and fluffs. At Winged Foot, where Trump is a member, the caddies got so used to seeing him kick his ball back onto the fairway they came up with a nickname for him: ‘Pele.’”
Trump even claimed to have won a golf tournament he didn’t actually play in.
But Trump’s love of the game is indisputable. As president, he played at least 289 times on his own properties alone. Taxpayers footed the $151.5 million travel and security bills, according to a HuffPost analysis in 2021.
Check out replies from commenters on X who didn’t buy Jack’s tee tale: