Report: Vanderbilt's 2019 NCAA baseball team turns down Trump's White House invite, Oregon State goes instead

Staff and wire reports | The Tennessean

Vanderbilt’s NCAA championship baseball team was not honored at a White House event last month to celebrate athletes from non-revenue sports, but Oregon State’s 2018 title team was there.

The Washington Post reported that Vanderbilt declined the White House invitation to the Commodores to join teams at the Nov. 22 “College Champions Event,” and the 2018 NCAA baseball champions appeared in their place.

According to the Post: "Vanderbilt spokesman Alan George said in a statement that the team 'respectfully declined' to attend the college champions event at the White House this past Friday 'due to long-standing travel plans for our student-athletes to return home for the Thanksgiving holiday.'"

An anonymous donor paid for Oregon State’s title team to attend the event, the Post reported.

READ THE STORY: Commodores championship team declines White House visit, 2018 champs attend instead

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The event, like several others involving teams honored at the White House, was not without some controversy, according to the Associated Press.

Traditional White House visits for champion college and pro sports teams have become politically loaded events during Trump’s presidency, and the Nov. 22 gathering was no different.

Elise Gout, a member of Columbia University’s 2019 championship fencing team, said she and three of her teammates had hoped to present Trump with the letter arguing that Trump has “perpetuated a culture that conditions women and minority gender identities to be silent — to sacrifice the space they have every right to take up.”

But Gout said the athletes were told by a Trump aide that they could not bring the letter with them during their brief meeting with Trump in the East Room of the White House. The letter stated it only represented the views of the four signatories, fencers who competed on the 2019 championship team and graduated earlier this year, and not Columbia University or the fencing team.

White House spokesman Judd Deere said the Columbia fencers’ visit with Trump was cordial, and White House staff extended an invitation for the athletes and coach to come back to the White House at a later date to discuss any policy concerns they have.

Some athletes, including members of the World Cup-winning women’s national soccer team and Sean Doolittle from the World Series champion Washington Nationals, have declined the White House invitations from Trump. Others, like the NBA’s Golden State Warriors and the NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles, have been disinvited after players criticized the president. Others have warmly embraced Trump.

The Columbia athletes’ letter criticized the administration for proposing changes to federal rules that would affect campus sexual assault survivors and for implementing new regulations that prohibit groups that receive federal grants from referring patients for abortion.

Trump, an avid golfer, spent a few moments with each team Friday, but he lingered a little bit longer with Stanford University’s men’s golf team. He invited all the champs to come take a peek at the Oval Office.

“So far, nobody’s turned that one down,” Trump joked.