President Donald Trump on Tuesday brought his feud with the NFL and some of its players over national anthem protests to his backdoor — literally. And that’s when something rare happened that shows just how polarizing his presidency and the racially tinged anthem debate has been.

A sitting president of the United States, flanked by Army and Marine Corps personnel, was heckled while standing just steps from the Oval Office.

As Trump retrieved his prepared remarks from inside his suit jacket, a man appeared to ask about the rights to free speech of professional football players. The president straightened his printed remarks on the familiar blue podium and glanced toward the source of the jeer. Some of the invited guests booed the heckler, who tried again.

But by the second attempt to engage the president, Trump had already started his brief remarks about “patriotism” and “freedom.”

Celebrating America

He spoke for just four minutes despite his and his team’s promotion of the event put together after the president disinvited the NFL Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. Ignoring the heckler, who was promptly escorted off the South Lawn, Trump stressed what he described as a requirement to “always” stand when the national anthem is played. (The heckler declined to disclose his identity as he was led away.)