The United States men’s hockey team won its first Olympic gold medal since 1980 on Sunday. They then celebrated throughout the Olympic village, but it was a moment in their locker room after the game that is now under major scrutiny, particularly on social media.
A congratulatory call from President Donald Trump to the team was posted to X by White House deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino and other outlets. In the call, Trump invites the Olympic champions to his State of the Union Address on Tuesday night in Washington, DC, and adds that he “has to” also invite the similarly accomplished USA women’s team.
In response, the US men laughed at what seemed to be Trump’s attempt at degrading the women’s team’s gold-medal achievement.
“I must tell you, we’re going to have to bring the women’s team, you do know that?” Trump says to a raucous response in the locker room. “I think if I didn’t do that, I probably would be impeached, okay?”
One of the main players the camera focuses on is Golden Goal scorer Jack Hughes. Hughes’s mother, Ellen Weinberg-Hughes, is a former silver medalist for Team USA at the 1992 World Championship and served as a player development consultant for the women’s hockey team this winter.
The call was made on Kash Patel’s phone. The FBI director’s attendance and participation in the Olympic celebrations have also been well documented and criticized. Patel, who says the team invited him into their locker room, was reportedly in Italy on official business.
According to Patel, the Olympic meetup was just a coincidence after he flew to Italy to visit the Milan Joint Operations Center, “a 24/7 interagency operation with international partners to support the Winter Olympics and Paralympic Games.”
Patel, a noted hockey fan, tweeted in July that he planned to attend the Olympics to watch Team USA men play, without mentioning any scheduled FBI-related duties.
Once in the locker room on Sunday, Patel was seen, on video provided to ProPublica’s William Turton, chugging beer, banging on a table, and wearing Matthew Tkachuk‘s gold medal.
He has now found himself in the thralls of hockey history twice in the past year, after he also made his way into the Washington Capitals’ locker room when Alex Ovechkin broke Wayne Gretzky’s all-time goals record last April.
Trump, currently serving his second term as President, has a long history of sexist remarks, highlighted by his 2005 comments caught on tape by Access Hollywood. Many members of the women’s team are also part of the LGBTQ community, a frequent target of attacks by Trump and his administration.
Throughout the Olympics, men’s players have supported the women’s team, with the Hughes brothers in particular attending their gold-medal matchup with Canada. Matthew and Brady Tkachuk were also spotted in the crowd at the women’s semifinal win over Sweden.
Jack Hughes and other players have also been friendly with several players on the women’s team, posing for photos during their celebrations in the village. Two of the team’s star defenders, Laila Edwards and Caroline “KK” Harvey, posted a photo they took with the newly-toothless Hughes ahead of the Olympic Closing Ceremony to their Instagram stories.
The women’s team has since declined Trump’s tepid invitation, citing “previously scheduled academic and professional commitments.” It is not yet known whether the men’s team will actually be able to attend the SOTU address either, as they may have obligations related to their NHL teams.
Patel, the newest FBI director, has criticized previous directors’ personal use of government-funded jets for travel. He has come under fire for doing just that to go on dates with his girlfriend and attend other hockey games. His latest excursion also comes at a tumultuous time back in North America, where leadership is needed.
Among the conflicts the director could be attending to include American tourists in Mexico getting issued shelter-in-place warnings after the death of a notorious cartel boss, the still unsolved case of missing 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie, and an attempted assassination of Trump at the President’s Florida residence.
