politics
Trump Hosts White House Brunch for Gold Star Mothers and Noah Syndergaard
President Donald Trump joined MLB free agent pitcher Noah Syndergaard and other athletes on May 5, 2026, to mark the reinstatement of the Presidential Fitness Test. Days later, Trump and first lady Melania Trump hosted separate Mother’s Day events honoring Gold Star and military mothers as well as Angel Moms who lost children to crimes by illegal immigrants.
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President Donald Trump hosted professional athletes at the White House on May 5, 2026, for an event focused on youth physical fitness. MLB free agent pitcher Noah Syndergaard joined members of the President’s Council on Physical Fitness to mark the reinstatement of the Presidential Fitness Test, which aims to promote exercise in public schools nationwide.
Syndergaard played catch with children on the White House grounds and demonstrated pull-up techniques.
Syndergaard said after the event, “I’m envious of the mental energy that this guy has, the sharpness he has, the comedic nature of everything he says.
Trump described Syndergaard as “a man that I wouldn’t want to get in a fight with,” according to the New York Post report on the event.
Three days later, on May 8, 2026, Trump hosted a brunch in the White House Rose Garden for Angel Moms and Gold Star Mothers as part of Mother’s Day observances. The Washington Times reported that the event honored mothers who lost children to crimes committed by people in the country illegally and mothers of service members killed in action.
Trump told attendees, “It used to be ’time heals all wounds,’ but it doesn’t.
Attendees included Tammy Nobles, whose daughter was killed, and Anna Zartuska, whose daughter Iryna Zartuska was stabbed to death by an illegal immigrant on a train in Charlotte, North Carolina, in August. Walter Javier Martinez was sentenced to 70 years in prison in 2022 in a related case cited by families at the event.
The previous Wednesday, May 6, 2026, Trump and first lady Melania Trump hosted a separate Mother’s Day event for America’s military mothers.
Separately, the Department of Justice is investigating the NFL’s media deals. The inquiry follows Rupert Murdoch lobbying President Trump at a White House dinner in February 2025 about NFL media rights, according to Business Insider. The Federal Communications Commission opened an inquiry into sports rights moving from broadcast television to streaming shortly afterward.
