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The Nation: The Ugly Underbelly of the US Men's Hockey Victory [View all]
The real Olympic heroes were the athletes who stood up for each other—and against Trump.
As for Team USA, it was ready to fight—literally—because Trump had deemed Canada, Canadian Bacon—style, the enemy, and the players were ready to follow orders. The US squad was chock-full of Trump supporters who were more than willing to provide a photo op for Vice President JD Vance and the embarrassing FBI director, Kash Patel.
When Trump called the US skier Hunter Hess “a real Loser” for expressing nuanced “mixed feelings” about representing the United States, US hockey player Brady Tkachuk sided with Trump, saying, “To represent the US at this stage in the Olympics is one of the greatest honors that I’ve ever had, so I’m truly grateful to be here representing the red, white, and blue.”
Unlike other US Olympians speaking out against this regime, men’s hockey players chose to be lickspittles. In that regard, this hockey team is part of a rather ignominious USA hockey gold-medal tradition. A fan at the 2026 Milano Cortina Games donned a hockey sweater with “1980” emblazoned across the chest, the year a US hockey team became a legendary symbol of national unity. But in the years that followed, Republicans have used that legend to sow division.
Trump holds incredible nostalgia for the “Miracle on Ice” Olympic hockey team of 1980. This was the squad that, in one of the great Olympic upsets of all time, defeated the USSR in the semifinals before winning the gold. Pundits turned the victory into a right-wing symbol. It showed that the country had moved away from the social struggles of the 1960s and ’70s and embraced the crypto-fascist variant of patriotism best exemplified in the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan.
In 2020, many members of that 1980 team rallied with Trump in Las Vegas, wearing their MAGA hats, laughing at Trump’s mockery of the Oscar-winning film Parasite, nodding solemnly as he asked why they don’t make films like Gone With the Wind anymore, and praising Trump repeatedly. For some reason, Trump asked team captain Mike Eruzione to tell the crowd he was a good golfer and Eruzione responded, “Whatever you say, sir.”
That team is now in their 60s and 70s, and Trump—as he did when partying with Jeffrey Epstein—is looking for younger models. The gold-medal-winning team at the Milano Cortina Olympics includes players who have caped for the president. Last year, at a White House visit following the Florida Panthers’ Stanley Cup victory, Matthew Tkachuk (Brady’s older brother) heaped praise on Trump: “It’s kind of like that cherry-on-top finish…to be here at the White House today and meet the president of the United States and lucky enough to have him honor us is just so cool and something that I honestly never would’ve imagined.” Addressing Trump directly, Tkachuk added, “This is such an incredible day for myself. You wake up every day really grateful to be an American, so thank you.”
This is 1980 cosplaying, but unlike then, the ugly underbelly is there for everyone to see. Partying with the players afterward was Patel, guzzling beer, jumping around, and thumping the table like a drunken frat boy. It was a humiliating display. He was there to represent Trump—and given Patel’s craven, ham-handed coverups of Trump’s connections to Epstein—there could not have been a better stand in for Trump himself.
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/us-hockey-olympics-gold-trump/
no paywall: http://archive.today/iBSwv
As for Team USA, it was ready to fight—literally—because Trump had deemed Canada, Canadian Bacon—style, the enemy, and the players were ready to follow orders. The US squad was chock-full of Trump supporters who were more than willing to provide a photo op for Vice President JD Vance and the embarrassing FBI director, Kash Patel.
When Trump called the US skier Hunter Hess “a real Loser” for expressing nuanced “mixed feelings” about representing the United States, US hockey player Brady Tkachuk sided with Trump, saying, “To represent the US at this stage in the Olympics is one of the greatest honors that I’ve ever had, so I’m truly grateful to be here representing the red, white, and blue.”
Unlike other US Olympians speaking out against this regime, men’s hockey players chose to be lickspittles. In that regard, this hockey team is part of a rather ignominious USA hockey gold-medal tradition. A fan at the 2026 Milano Cortina Games donned a hockey sweater with “1980” emblazoned across the chest, the year a US hockey team became a legendary symbol of national unity. But in the years that followed, Republicans have used that legend to sow division.
Trump holds incredible nostalgia for the “Miracle on Ice” Olympic hockey team of 1980. This was the squad that, in one of the great Olympic upsets of all time, defeated the USSR in the semifinals before winning the gold. Pundits turned the victory into a right-wing symbol. It showed that the country had moved away from the social struggles of the 1960s and ’70s and embraced the crypto-fascist variant of patriotism best exemplified in the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan.
In 2020, many members of that 1980 team rallied with Trump in Las Vegas, wearing their MAGA hats, laughing at Trump’s mockery of the Oscar-winning film Parasite, nodding solemnly as he asked why they don’t make films like Gone With the Wind anymore, and praising Trump repeatedly. For some reason, Trump asked team captain Mike Eruzione to tell the crowd he was a good golfer and Eruzione responded, “Whatever you say, sir.”
That team is now in their 60s and 70s, and Trump—as he did when partying with Jeffrey Epstein—is looking for younger models. The gold-medal-winning team at the Milano Cortina Olympics includes players who have caped for the president. Last year, at a White House visit following the Florida Panthers’ Stanley Cup victory, Matthew Tkachuk (Brady’s older brother) heaped praise on Trump: “It’s kind of like that cherry-on-top finish…to be here at the White House today and meet the president of the United States and lucky enough to have him honor us is just so cool and something that I honestly never would’ve imagined.” Addressing Trump directly, Tkachuk added, “This is such an incredible day for myself. You wake up every day really grateful to be an American, so thank you.”
This is 1980 cosplaying, but unlike then, the ugly underbelly is there for everyone to see. Partying with the players afterward was Patel, guzzling beer, jumping around, and thumping the table like a drunken frat boy. It was a humiliating display. He was there to represent Trump—and given Patel’s craven, ham-handed coverups of Trump’s connections to Epstein—there could not have been a better stand in for Trump himself.
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/us-hockey-olympics-gold-trump/
no paywall: http://archive.today/iBSwv
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