President Joe Biden said he would play golf in the PGA in response to a question about the league’s controversial merger with the Saudi Arabia-backed LIV league.
The president gave a small wave when asked about the surprise deal and said, “I plan to play in the PGA.”
Biden, who loves golf and played with his brother at Joint Base Andrews on Sunday, spoke about the controversy at a meeting with his cabinet on Tuesday.
His comments came after White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly declined to comment on the merger, saying, “I’m not going to address it from the podium.”
“I intend to play in the PGA,” President Joe Biden told reporters
In a shock move on Tuesday, the PGA ended its war with rival LIV Gulf and decided to merge with the Saudi Arabian-backed entity – despite PGA commissioner Jay Monahan told reporters last year that such a regulation was “off the table.”
The PGA and European Tours have signed an agreement with the Saudi-backed circuit to merge their businesses into a new, yet-to-be-named company. The merger ends the ongoing lawsuits between the rivals. Financial details of the deal have not been disclosed.
The move represents a major win for LIV Golf, which has been shunned by many of the sport’s icons, including Tour legends Jack Nicklaus, Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods, who reportedly turned down a $1 billion deal to defect in 2022.
But LIV Golf has managed to buy some of the world’s best players and spend hundreds of millions on the likes of Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson and Phil Mickelson. The problem for the PGA Tour now is reintegrating the defectors who took Saudi money with the players who stayed loyal by refusing lucrative LIV contracts.
LIV Golf has been criticized for its ties to Saudi Arabia’s controversial Public Investment Fund (PIF), with critics accusing the kingdom of “sporting” its human rights record. LIV defectors, meanwhile, have been pilloried for accusations of greed.
President Joe Biden sits in a golf cart Sunday as he plays golf with his brother Jimmy Biden, left, at Andrews Air Force Base
It has already become the subject of criticism.
Families whose loved ones died in the September 11 terrorist attacks have criticized the deal.
A group of family members called 9/11 Families United said its members were “appalled and deeply offended” by the deal, calling it a “betrayal” by the PGA Tour and Monahan.
“The PGA and Monahan only seem to have become more paid Saudi shills, which have cost billions of dollars to clear the Saudi reputation,” said 9/11 Families United president Terry Strada.
But Donald Trump, whose golf courses have hosted several LIV events, celebrated the move.
He broke the news on his social media network: GREAT NEWS FROM LIV GOLF. A BIG BEAUTIFUL, AND GLAMOR DEAL FOR THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF GOLF. GONGRATS EVERYONE!!!’
Donald Trump, whose golf courses have hosted several LIV events, trumpeted the news
Former President Donald Trump, left, talks with Yasir Al-Rumayyan, governor of the PIF Fund
Tuesday’s merger comes one year after LIV Golf’s first event and ends the legal battle with the PGA.
While the PGA was accused of violating antitrust laws by banning LIV players from the Tour, the leading golf circuit refuted its Saudi-backed rivals, accusing the outfit of interfering in its deals.
Players who defected to LIV Golf were banned from PGA events, but continued to play in the majors. For example, Koepka of LIV Golf won the PGA Championship last month.
Other critics said the deal is designed to help restore Saudi Arabia’s tarnished reputation around the world.
Saudi Arabia has come under attack for its treatment of women, homosexuals and corporal punishment, among other things. Last year, the kingdom executed nearly 200 people (compared to 18 in the United States).
In addition, Saudi Arabia angered the United States in 2018 with the assassination of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a critic of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Khashoggi was invited to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, where he was murdered and dismembered.
Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, claimed on Twitter that the PGA rejected the idea of a merger just months earlier.
“So weird,” Murphy tweeted. “PGA officials were in my office a few months ago to talk about how the Saudis should disqualify them from participating in a major American sport because of their human rights record.
“I think maybe their concerns weren’t really about human rights?”