{"id":585586,"date":"2026-04-06T09:56:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T09:56:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/585586\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T09:56:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T09:56:09","slug":"will-donald-trump-attend-the-masters-at-augusta-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/585586\/","title":{"rendered":"Will Donald Trump attend The Masters at Augusta National?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Your support helps us to tell the story<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 cJuFfN\">From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it&#8217;s investigating the financials of Elon Musk&#8217;s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, &#8216;The A Word&#8217;, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 cJuFfN\">At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 cJuFfN\">The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n<p>Your support makes all the difference.Read more<\/p>\n<p>It is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/sport\/golf\/masters-2026-rory-mcilroy-date-time-tv-schedule-b2950827.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">one of the biggest weeks in golf,<\/a> yet The Masters is likely to be conspicuous by the absence of one of the sport\u2019s biggest names.<\/p>\n<p>Donald Trump, the US President, might be an avid golfer and owner of some of the most prestigious properties in the sport, including Trump Turnberry and Trump International Doral, yet \u201chis personality doesn\u2019t fit\u201d at Augusta, according to Butch Harmon, one of the most respected voices in the sport and Tiger Woods\u2019 former coach.<\/p>\n<p>Trump is unlikely to grace this hallowed and idyllic corner of Georgia this week, despite so often being part of the sport\u2019s narrative.<\/p>\n<p>Eager to set the agenda, as was the case when <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/sport\/golf\/tiger-woods-trump-the-masters-2026-b2946815.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">rumours swirled surrounding the return<\/a> to golf of his \u201cgood friend\u201d Woods.<\/p>\n<p>That was before the 15-time major champion <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/sport\/golf\/tiger-woods-statement-car-crash-masters-dui-b2949627.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">decided to \u201cstep away and seek treatment\u201d<\/a> following a DUI arrest after another vehicle accident. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think you can answer that [why Trump is unlikely to be at Augusta] yourself,\u201d Harmon said on a media call, including The Independent. \u201cBecause he&#8217;s Trump. I think he is who he is. He&#8217;s full of himself. He&#8217;s the type of person that I don&#8217;t think fits the profile of an Augusta member.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Augusta has had former presidents as members, despite its exclusivity, reportedly limited to 300. Notably, Dwight Eisenhower retains a great legacy at the club, with a cabin and tree on the course named after him.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Trump-declares-evil-wont-prevail-in-Easter-message-as-Iran-war-rages-on.png\"  loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"Trump has a deep history with the game of golf\" class=\"sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn\"\/>Trump has a deep history with the game of golf (Donald J. Trump)<\/p>\n<p>And Harmon has known Trump his entire life, with his father, Claude Harmon, a Masters champion in 1948, the former head professional at the prestigious American course Winged Foot, where Trump was a long-time member.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI&#8217;ve known Donald pretty much my whole life. What you see is what you get with him. And I don&#8217;t think his personality fits the membership at Augusta,\u201d Harmon claims.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don&#8217;t think that [being president] has anything to do with it, because there&#8217;s been a lot of other presidents who played golf, and they&#8217;re not members. Clinton, Obama&#8230; they played golf. I think it&#8217;s just his personality doesn&#8217;t mix with that particular club. That\u2019s as politically correct as I can be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With a legendary career working on the swings of Woods, Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson, among others, Harmon has emerged as a fine pundit and will form part of Sky Sports\u2019 coverage at Augusta this week. <\/p>\n<p>But he was absent at last year\u2019s Ryder Cup, which descended into chaos due to the behaviour of some American fans, with Rory McIlroy claiming <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/sport\/golf\/rory-mcilroy-ryder-cup-abuse-fans-usa-b2893565.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">\u201chorrific\u201d abuse directed at him and his family<\/a> throughout the intense battle, with Europe eventually prevailing 15-13.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Coach-Butch-Harmon-stands-in-the-practice-area-at-Augusta-before-the-2025-Masters.jpeg\"  loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"Coach Butch Harmon stands in the practice area at Augusta before the 2025 Masters\" class=\"sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn\"\/>Coach Butch Harmon stands in the practice area at Augusta before the 2025 Masters (Getty Images)<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI thought the Ryder Cup was disgusting,\u201d said Harmon, with his fellow commentator <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/sport\/golf\/ewen-murray-sky-sports-retire-ryder-cup-abuse-b2943073.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ewen Murray casting doubt on his future due to the scenes at Bethpage Black<\/a>. \u201cIt was embarrassing being an American. I love the Ryder Cup, it&#8217;s my favourite one to broadcast and being from New York, I had planned to work with the Sky Sports team, but I decided to pull out for that main reason.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI felt we would spend more time talking about what&#8217;s going on in the gallery with the fans being unruly than we would the golf and I just didn&#8217;t feel I wanted to be part of it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI&#8217;m disgusted with the way it was. But this is the beauty of Augusta. These are the best-behaved patrons in all of golf. I love the Open Championship because all the gallery people understand golf and they understand how to cheer.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut this place, it&#8217;s like a holy grail of golf in the US, and it&#8217;s difficult to get a ticket to come to this event. It&#8217;s probably the hardest event to get a ticket to. The patrons there are very well behaved, because they&#8217;re the same people that come back year after year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI hated the way things were going at the Ryder Cup. I thought it was a terrible embarrassment for the United States, and let&#8217;s hope it never happens again.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Watch more live Masters coverage than ever before, exclusively on Sky Sports and NOW from Thursday 9 April<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":585587,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[49,48,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-585586","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=585586"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585586\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/585587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=585586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=585586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=585586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}