Trump welcomes LSU to the White House: ‘Go Tigers’

President Trump welcomed the Louisiana State University (LSU) football team to the White House on Friday to celebrate the Tigers’ victory in the College Football Playoff national championship earlier this week.

Trump spent several minutes of his remarks in the East Room narrating key moments of Monday night’s championship game, which he attended in New Orleans along with first lady Melania Trump.

“This LSU team will long be remembered as one of the greatest in college football history,” Trump said. “And I just want to say, congratulations and go Tigers.”

Trump remarked upon the difficult schedule that LSU faced on the road to the title game and reminisced about memorable plays from its 42-25 victory over Clemson University.

The president and first lady walked onto the field during the national anthem at the start of the championship game, receiving loud cheers from the audience.

In November, Trump also attended LSU’s first win in eight years over archrival Alabama.

On Friday he described the Tigers, who went undefeated for the first time in more than 60 years, as filled “with heart and skill and hope and courage and passion and strength and unbreakable will to win.”

At points throughout his remarks, Trump recognized fans of the team and Louisiana natives in the crowd — including Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise (R) — and praised LSU’s players and head coach Ed Orgeron as possibly the “most beloved coach anywhere in the land.”

Trump’s Friday remarks were lighthearted. He quipped that Clemson’s football players, who were invited to the White House last year after winning the championship, “ate so much food we didn’t know the hell to do.”

At one point, Trump also likened LSU quarterback Joe Burrow, the winner of this year’s Heisman Trophy, to New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.

“Oh, he’s going to be so rich,” Trump said, gesturing to Burrow, who is expected to go No. 1 in the NFL draft. “He looks sort of like a young Tom Brady.”

Trump also briefly mentioned his Senate impeachment trial at the end of his remarks after the team gave him a jersey with the name “Trump” and the number 45 on the back.

“We’ll take pictures behind the Resolute Desk,” Trump said, inviting the team into the Oval Office. “It’s been there a long time — a lot of presidents, some good, some not so good.”

“But you’ve got a good one now, even though they’re trying to impeach the son of a bitch. Can you believe that?” Trump said. “We’ve got the greatest economy we’ve ever had, Joe.”

“We’ve got the greatest military. We rebuilt it. We took out those terrorists like your football team would have taken out those terrorists, right?” Trump continued, an apparent reference to recent U.S. operations against ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.