The only reason Donald Trump ran for president in 2016 was as an act of revenge against NFL team owners, says Stephen A. Smith.
The year was 2014 and NBC’s biggest reality TV star was among three qualified bidders in the race for outgoing owner Ralph Wilson’s Buffalo Bills.
Smith, who was already known to Trump at the time, called the ESPN personality to talk about his hopes of eventually becoming an owner of the team.
“He called me in 2014,” Smith told comedian Bill Maher on Random club. ‘This is a true story.
‘It says: ”Stephen A.” – (he) had a secretary – ”Mr. Trump is on the line,” etc., Smith continued. ‘(Trump) puts himself into play. He says, “Stephen A., I’m trying to buy the Buffalo Bills.” The price was 1.4 billion dollars.
Donald Trump ran for president in 2016 to return to the NFL, says Stephen A. Smith
Trump was rumored to be interested in the Bills, Cowboys and Colts at various times.
‘He had about $1.1 billion. They told me I wouldn’t get the equipment. He said, “Stephen A., if these motherfuckers get in my way,” talking about NFL owners, “these motherfuckers get in my way, I’ll take them all back.” . “I’m going to run for president.” That’s what he said.’
Smith accused Trump of attacking Colin Kaepernick and other players who knelt in protest during the national anthem “just to get the owners back.” Trump’s focus on the protesting players drew widespread criticism of the league, which still maintained its dominance in the ratings.
The Bills were eventually sold to Buffalo Sabers owners Terry and Kim Pegula, the parents of tennis star Jessica Pegula, for $1.4 billion.
Trump’s former friend and media ally Howard Stern offered a different theory in 2019, saying Trump ran for president as a “stunt” to gain leverage in “The Apprentice” contract negotiations.
“I firmly believed that Donald did not want to run for president,” Stern told Stephen Colbert. ‘I don’t think he was serious. I don’t think he wanted to be president. I knew him. He had a great life at Mar-A-Lago, running around town, playing golf and having a great time.’
Trump’s fascination with professional football resulted in several attempts to acquire ownership of the NFL.
In 1983, Trump expressed interest in purchasing the Baltimore Colts, who were ultimately not sold but relocated to Indianapolis.
A year later, Trump had the opportunity to buy the Dallas Cowboys for just $50 million, but he turned it down, allowing Jerry Jones to acquire the franchise for $140 million. Now the Cowboys rank as the most valuable sports team with a Forbes valuation of $9 billion.
Terry and Kim Pegula eventually purchased the Bills from Ralph Wilson for $1.4 billion.
Bills players react after kicker Tyler Bass kicks the game-winning field goal against Miami
Trump’s decision to pass on the Cowboys for $50 million in 1984 allowed Jerry Jones to buy the team a few years later for $140 million. Dallas is now the most valuable sports team at $9 billion
And Trump wasn’t just using money to get an NFL team. He also tried using leverage, according to Jeff Pearlman’s 2018 book, ‘Football for a Buck: The Crazy Rise and Crazier Demise of the USFL.’
Launched in 1983, the USFL was a spring football league that featured a surprising array of talent, including future Trump political ally Herschel Walker. A year after starting the league, Trump would buy Walker’s team, the New Jersey Generals, which he would own until the league went bankrupt in 1986.
The abbreviated history of the USFL is defined by several clear mistakes, such as the decision to add six new franchises after a promising inaugural season in 1983. But perhaps the biggest misstep was choosing to move its season to the fall of 1985 and challenge directly to the NFL, a decision that was heavily influenced by Trump.
Donald Trump owned the New Jersey Generals for three years until the USFL went bankrupt when he pushed to move the season schedule from spring to fall.
“In the lead-up to buying the team, I was talking exclusively about spring football and how great the league was, and ‘I love what the USFL is doing and blah, blah, blah,'” Pearlman told DailyMail. com in 2018. you get approved as an owner, you buy the equipment and immediately: ‘We need to move to fall; “We need to take on the NFL.”
“His great quote was: ‘If God wanted football in the spring, he wouldn’t have invented baseball.'”
According to interviews conducted by Pearlman, Trump’s initial plan was for the USFL to fold and the NFL to absorb the Generals as an expansion franchise.
However, during a meeting with then-NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle at the Pierre Hotel in New York City in 1984, that plan fell through.
“He basically told Rozelle,” Pearlman explained, “I really don’t give a damn about the USFL.” I want an NFL team. What do I have to do to get into the NFL?
“It was basically a bid to ruin the USFL.”
Trump did not get the response he was looking for.
“Rozelle told him, ‘As long as I’m commissioner, you’ll never have a team,'” Pearlman continued. ‘He didn’t trust him. He thought he was a bastard. She didn’t say, “I think you’re a bastard,” but Rozelle made her feelings about Trump very clear. (Rozelle) also made them known during the trial when she testified.’
Late NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle Reportedly Told Trump He Would Never Own a League Team
That testimony came in 1986 after Trump convinced his fellow USFL owners to file an antitrust lawsuit against the NFL.
When called to the stand, Trump claimed that Rozelle promised him an NFL franchise at that 1984 meeting if he could persuade the USFL to maintain a spring schedule and refrain from filing the antitrust lawsuit.
Rozelle testified that Trump’s claim was false, but a former USFL owner used a different term to describe the real estate mogul’s testimony.
“I got an email from another USFL owner,” Pearlman said. “And this is a guy who actually voted for Trump and he said to me, ‘I read the book.’ I wish you had talked more about how Trump lied under oath because that always pissed me off.”
According to Pearlman, Trump had assured his fellow owners that the USFL would win the lawsuit, pointing to his choice of notorious former Senator Joseph McCarthy, attorney Roy Cohn. Technically, Trump was right: the NFL lost, but the USFL’s efforts were ultimately doomed by several costly mistakes.
Trump is seen as an owner of the Generals along with running back and future ally Herschel Walker
“One of the other owners, Jerry Argovitz of the Houston Gamblers, begged Trump not to file the lawsuit in New York,” Pearlman said. ‘He said (the jury) wouldn’t sympathize with the plaintiffs… Trump says, ‘No, no, New York is my hometown.’ I know it well.”
Apparently Trump was wrong.
Even before the jury decided to reduce the settlement to $1, Trump’s testimony and even his presence in the courtroom seemed to irritate one of the jurors.
“I interviewed one of the jurors,” Pearlman said. ‘She was saying that Trump was simply the worst witness ever.
“The whole goal of the USFL was to portray the NFL as the bully,” Pearlman continued. “Trump gets on the stand and he’s a bully, a bully. He told me he vividly remembered Trump trying to intimidate jurors from the stand by staring at them.
Paul Domowitch of the Philadelphia Daily News also reported on Trump’s anthem singing habits in the USFL.
There’s another accusation peculiar to Trump’s time in the USFL: He was accused of sitting during the national anthem.
“I’m sure sometimes Trump stood and sometimes he didn’t, but it’s funny that he’s criticizing all these guys for kneeling during the anthem when it was well known – and not even a big deal – that Donald Trump would sit during the anthems.” “Pearlman told the Daily Mail in 2018.
“(He) worked, took calls, conducted interviews,” Pearlman continued. “I probably never gave it a second thought.” (This statement echoes that of Paul Domowitch of the Philadelphia Daily Newswho tweeted in May that he once watched Trump spend “the entire anthem berating” the president of the USFL’s Philadelphia Stars).
The Trump White House did not respond to DailyMail.com’s request for comment on the allegation at the time of the book’s publication.