By JOHN WAWROW and MELISSA GOLDIN
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. girls’s hockey gold medal-winning staff has politely declined an invite from President Donald Trump to attend his State of the Union tackle on Tuesday.
“We’re sincerely grateful for the invitation prolonged to our gold medal–successful U.S. Ladies’s Hockey Crew and deeply respect the popularity of their extraordinary achievement,” the U.S. girls’s staff mentioned in an announcement launched Monday. “As a result of timing and beforehand scheduled tutorial {and professional} commitments following the Video games, the athletes are unable to take part. They have been honored to be included and are grateful for the acknowledgment.”
Trump additionally invited the U.S. males’s gold medal-winning staff.
Scheduling might be a problem because the NHL common season resumes with 5 video games on Wednesday and the PWHL resumes on Thursday.
Logistics performed a task within the determination, as lots of the girls gamers weren’t scheduled to reach in North America till Monday night. The lads’s staff flew by constitution to Miami earlier Monday. The ladies took a business flight and have been scheduled to land in Atlanta.
An individual aware of the scenario instructed The Related Press that the ladies’s gamers didn’t be taught of the invite till late Sunday night time, making it tough to alter their journey plans. The individual spoke on situation of anonymity as a result of they weren’t approved to talk publicly concerning the staff’s journey plans.
The White Home didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon the standing of each groups.
When extending the invitation to the boys’s staff on Sunday night time, Trump mentioned, “I need to inform you, we’re going to need to carry the ladies’s staff, you do know that.” Trump joked that if he didn’t additionally invite the ladies’s staff, “I do imagine I most likely could be impeached.”
The Olympic event featured two thrilling medal finals, each ending in extra time, with the American women beating Canada 2-1 within the gold medal sport on Thursday. The U.S. men beat Canada on Sunday.
“It’s been a whirlwind, it’s been wonderful. It’s a dream of ours, it was such a tremendous strategy to unite the nation,” Matthew Tkachuk of the U.S. males’s staff mentioned after arriving in Miami.
“We felt the assist being throughout the Atlantic and now being again on residence soil we might really feel it the second the wheels hit the bottom. So excited to be again within the biggest nation on the planet and so excited to have fun.”
Tkachuk mentioned it was an honor to listen to from Trump after the win. “And so we’re positively honored to symbolize him and the tens of millions and tens of millions throughout the nation.”
Vice President JD Vance attended two of the U.S. girls’s preliminary spherical wins along with his household over the primary week of the Video games.
AP writers Stephen Whyno, Charles Odum in Atlanta, and Freida Frisaro in Miami contributed to this report.
AP Winter Olympic: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
