President Donald Trump said he would pardon Pete Rose, but only after reporters reminded him why the late MLB hits king needed one. The exchange happened at the White House alongside UFC CEO Dana White, mixing a pardon pledge with a brief moment of confusion over Rose’s criminal record.
Donald Trump asks about Pete Rose’s criminal conviction at the White House
Trump reopened the subject of a pardon for Rose while taking questions with White at his side. A reporter raised Trump’s past statements about clemency for the baseball legend, and White answered first, saying he considered a pardon fair. Trump then interrupted with a question of his own. “By the way, why does he need a pardon? He was not really convicted of a crime – ” he began, before a reporter clarified: “It was tax charges, sir.”
“Oh, he did? I’d give Pete Rose a pardon,” Trump said. He added that he believed Rose “was very mistreated” and pointed to Rose’s 4,256 hits, calling the record untouchable. Moreover, the pardon Trump described covers Rose’s federal tax case, not the gambling that triggered his fallout with MLB. Rose pleaded guilty in April 1990 to two felony counts of filing false income returns for 1985 and 1987. He admitted to underreporting more than $300,000 earned from appearances, autographs, memorabilia, and gambling winnings.
Donald Trump distinguished between Pete Rose betting on his own team and betting against it. “He was gambling. He shouldn’t have done it, but he went through 40 years of hell,” Trump said. He also repeated his call for the latter’s induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Rose, known as “Charlie Hustle,” was a 17-time All-Star, three-time batting champion, 1973 NL MVP and World Series MVP. He died last September at 83. Commissioner Rob Manfred lifted Rose’s lifetime ban posthumously in May 2025, though Hall of Fame voting remains in the hands of writers and Hall committees, not MLB.
