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President Donald Trump reaffirmed his stance that Pete Rose should be in the Baseball Hall of Fame on Friday.
Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump suggested that his absence from the Hall of Fame is a “disservice.”
“I think Pete Rose should have been in the Baseball Hall of Fame a long time ago,” Trump said. “I think baseball did a great disservice by not respecting his achievements on the field.”
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred removed Rose and several other players from the ineligible list in May 2025, allowing the possibility of those athletes being voted into the Hall of Fame. He admitted at an owners meeting news conference that Trump’s support for Rose was one of the many factors that went into the decision.
“The president was one of a number of voices that was supportive of the idea that this was the right decision,” Manfred said last May. “Obviously, I have respect for the office, and the advice that he gave I paid attention to, but I had a lot of other people that were weighing in on the topic as well.”
Trump wrote on Truth Social in March 2025 that he would pardon Rose. He and Manfred met in April about Rose’s Hall of Fame candidacy.
“Major League Baseball didn’t have the courage or decency to put the late, great, Pete Rose, also known as ‘Charlie Hustle,’ into the Baseball Hall of fame. Now he is dead, will never experience the thrill of being selected, even though he was a FAR BETTER PLAYER than most of those who made it, and can only be named posthumously. WHAT A SHAME!” Trump wrote.
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“Anyway, over the next few weeks I will be signing a complete PARDON of Pete Rose, who shouldn’t have been gambling on baseball, but only bet on HIS TEAM WINNING. He never betted against himself, or the other team. He had the most hits, by far, in baseball history, and won more games than anyone in sports history. Baseball, which is dying all over the place, should get off its fat, lazy a–, and elect Pete Rose, even though far too late, into the Baseball Hall of Fame!”
Rose died in September 2024 at the age of 83 from hypertensive and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.
Rose admitted to gambling in 2004 after years of claiming his innocence. He died in September 2024 and predicted 10 days before his death that he would not make the Hall of Fame until after he died, if at all.
It was found that Rose gambled on the Reds, only to win, while he was both a manager and a player.
Fox News Digital’s Ryan Gaydos and Ryan Morik contributed to this report.
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