Donald Trump’s long-time golf partner admitted the president has a habit of skipping putts, but he claims it’s for a good reason.
The president has been accused of cheating relentlessly at his favorite pastime by kicking balls from the rough into the fairway, instructing his caddies to throw opponents’ balls into bunkers and awarding himself numerous “gimme putts,” according to The Times of London.
He also regularly claims to “win” tournaments at his own clubs, including competitions where he has skipped rounds or where nobody has seen him play, The Palm Beach Post reported.
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During an interview with The Times, the head professional at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, John Nieporte, said the president really does win tournaments and claimed those gimmes—which speed up the game by letting a player pick up the ball and counts it as holed—are justified.
The president would “give a putt here and there,” Nieporte said, but it was because Trump had a “tight schedule” and couldn’t spend “hours and hours” on the course, he told The Times.
Despite his busy schedule, Trump has managed to go golfing nearly 40 times since taking office on Jan. 20, spending most of his weekends at his courses in New Jersey, Virginia and Florida, according to a website that tracks his play.
The president golfed through it in April when the markets were crashing over his tariff policy, and again last weekend when MAGA was in a tailspin over the Jeffrey Epstein saga.
The 79-year-old Trump and 58-year-old Nieporte have played for more than 25 years and still hit the course regularly, often with Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and with golf professional RJ Nakashian, according to The Times.
The president’s team usually wins.
Golfers have also criticized Trump’s policy on mulligans, where players are allowed to re-hit errant shots without taking penalties.
But Nieporte insisted that Trump “doesn’t rely on mulligans” during competition and said “the proof’s in the pudding” when it comes to Trump’s golf skills.
He said he has seen Trump win club championships by sinking 60-foot putts, and that the president once hit a four iron 210 yards to within 10 feet of the hole—just 16 yards farther than the world’s no. 1 player, 29-year-old Scottie Scheffler, hits his four iron.
In April, Trump’s physician Sean Barbabella cited the president’s “frequent victories in golf events” as evidence of his “excellent cognitive and physical health.” The president has said he squeezes in the victories “between meetings and phone calls.”
