Donald Trump on Monday sided with a high school football coach who was fired for praying with some of his players after each game.

Joe Kennedy, who lost his job in January, is suing the Bremerton, Washington school district for religious discrimination in a case that the Republican presidential nominee called 'absolutely outrageous.'

Kennedy, a former U.S. Marine Corps gunnery sergeant, turned up in the audience of a northern Virginia event hosted by the Retired American Warriors political action committee – a new organization populated largely by religious-right veterans.

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Donald Trump said today that he sided with a high school football coach who was fired for praying with students

Coach Joe Kennedy (pictured) was ordered to stop kneeling, bowing his head or praying around students

Trump, the Republican nominee for president, mentioned Kennedy's case while answering a question about religious freedom in the military, and was surprised to learn the former coach was in the room.

'Have we ever had a time like this? Seriously. Have we ever – has there ever been a thing like what's going on?' Trump asked.

'The other day ... I was watching one of the news programs, and they had a, I think, high school football coach. You know, they're going into battle.'

'Oh, is he here? Oh! Stand up!' Trump urged as applause rang out.

'Wow. They really went after you, for saying a prayer before the – that is just – I didn't know you'd be here,' he said.

'The world is changing, isn't it? So you're not allowed to pray before a football game. I thought it was horrible. I thought it was horrible.'

Kennedy said the school district 'put me on suspension, and then at the end of the year they gave me a really adverse write-up of how well I did my job.'

'I didn't change anything for eight years. Always prayed after every game,' he said.

'And they just really slammed me on it, and said what a horrible person I was. And ended up just not renewing my contract, so ultimately firing me.'

Kennedy was known for dropping to one knee on the 50-yard line and praying by himself for less than a minute at the conclusion of each game he coached. Some students later chose to join his private worship.

Last September the school district warned him to stop. He would not be permitted to pray near any students or give them the impression that he might be praying, it warned him. That included kneeling or bowing his head.

He refused. Education administrators benched him.

'Coach Kennedy made a covenant with God that he would give thanks through prayer, at the end of each game, for what the players had accomplished and for the opportunity to be part of their lives through the game of football,' his federal lawsuit says.

It also accuses school administrators of setting a double standard that disadvantages Christians, citing an assistant coach who recited a Buddhist chant at the football stadium each game day.

That coach 'has never been suspended, let alone dismissed, on the basis of his religious expression,' the lawsuit argues.

'I think that is absolutely outrageous. I think it's outrageous,' Trump told Kennedy on Monday, citing what he called a lack of respect by governments for 'religious liberty.'

'I think it's very, very sad and outrageous,' he said.

Trump added that schools should strike a compromise that protects the freedom of religious expression while also ensuring students aren't pressured into participating.