Among medal of freedom honorees, a big donor stands out

In 2016, the Adelsons provided badly needed backing for Trump, and in the recent midterm elections contributed more than $120 million to Republicans. Sheldon Adelson has a direct line to the president and helped to persuade him to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem — a fact that Trump noted at the White House ceremony Friday, straying from his prepared remarks.

He also joked that Adelson, whom he called “Shel,” “didn’t make the front row.”

“He’s probably angry,” Trump added.

The Presidential Medal of Freedom, established by President John F. Kennedy, has always reflected a president’s personal tastes, biases and, sometimes, to be sure, political reward. President Barack Obama, for instance, awarded the medal to Warren Buffett, the legendary investor whose support in 2008 helped to give him credibility.

Kyle Kopko, a professor of political science at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania who has written scholarly reports on the medal-awarding process, said Trump had simply followed in that tradition.

“In fairness, there have been a number of recipients who were selected for their political dispositions — and I am sure that was a factor here,” Kopko said. “But I am sure it was not the only factor.”

“We probably oversimplify because, oh, the Adelsons gave a lot of money,” he said. “There are other factors that make Miriam Adelson an ideal candidate in Trump’s mind.”

The White House described what it considered some of those factors. “As a committed member of the American Jewish community, she has supported Jewish schools, Holocaust memorial organizations, Friends of the Israel Defense Forces and Birthright Israel, among other causes,” the White House said.

Still, in honoring Adelson, Trump seemed to take the idea of rewarding big donors to new heights. And he did not make much of an attempt to show the kind of bipartisanship that previous presidents did in selecting any of the other honorees, either.

President Ronald Reagan selected Chief Justice Earl Warren, like him a former Republican governor of California but one whose liberal court was reviled by conservatives. Reagan also draped a medal around the neck of Eunice Kennedy Shriver. President Bill Clinton gave the medal to former Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas a year after the president defeated him in the 1996 election. Obama honored President George Bush.

Most of Trump’s choices — Sen. Orrin Hatch and Roger Staubach, the former Navy and Dallas Cowboys quarterback, in addition to Adelson — are strong Republicans. Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016, was the court’s leading conservative. Another nominee, Alan Page, a defensive tackle for the Minnesota Vikings who went on to become a state Supreme Court justice, has been aligned with the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in Minnesota, but his election was considered nonpartisan.

Ruth and Presley were not known to have clear partisan leanings.

Scalia, who is frequently invoked by Trump as a model for a Supreme Court justice, was known as a forceful writer and strong-willed voice of judicial conservatism. And thanks to the stalling tactics of Senate Republicans, Scalia’s death gave Trump the opportunity to name his successor, Justice Neil Gorsuch, early in his presidency, a choice that has proved much more popular than his second selection for the court, Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Presiding over the ceremony in the White House’s East Room, which was also attended by Cabinet secretaries and some of Scalia’s former colleagues, Trump had a personal word for all of the winners or their families. After reading the list of Scalia’s nine children, he joked to his widow, Maureen, by saying: “You were very busy. Wow. I always knew I liked him.”

About Hatch, he said: “He liked me from the very beginning and therefore I like him,” adding, “I guess I’m not supposed to say it, but that’s the way life works, right?”

Hatch is the senior Republican member of the Senate, with more than four decades in office, and is retiring when his term ends in January. He has also been a strong supporter of the president, at one point saying Trump may be remembered as one of the finest in history. But he has also conceded that he did not always feel that way.

“Eight years ago to 10 years ago, Trump was not what I consider to be a pillar of virtue,” Hatch said. “I think he has changed a lot of his life once he was elected. I think Trump is a much better person today than he was then.”

Presley dominated American music and culture for decades, selling more than 1 billion records and starring in 31 films in a period of peak fame that coincided with Trump’s teenage years and young adulthood. He will be forever linked to another Republican president, Richard Nixon, because of the famous picture of the two shaking hands in 1970 that is among the most popular at the National Archives.

When Trump got to him, the president listened as a clip was played from one of Presley’s gospel songs, “How Great Thou Art,” and noted that he had personally added the song to the program. He said he had once seen Presley perform in Las Vegas, and recalled hearing an announcer say “Elvis has left the house.”

Celebrities have long been part of the awards: Oprah Winfrey, Ellen DeGeneres, Aretha Franklin and Bruce Springsteen are among recent winners. Robert De Niro was honored by Obama, a year before the actor had some unprintable words for Trump. Some recipients, like Mother Teresa and Norman Rockwell, were the safest of safe choices.

But Trump chose to go far back in time in choosing both Presley, who died in 1977, and Ruth, the New York Yankees slugger who has been dead longer than all but one other previous recipient, Kopko said. Trump was 2 when Ruth died, in 1948.

A man of many nicknames, “the Babe,” “the Bambino” and “the Sultan of Swat,” and perhaps the most famous baseball player, George Herman Ruth Jr. led the Yankees to seven American League pennants and four World Series championships. He was a prodigious fundraiser for World War II causes. Trump said Ruth “raised money and raised hell” and said that was perhaps why the honor was so long in coming.

Ruth was not notably active in politics but once famously defended his salary, which at the time was more than President Herbert Hoover was paid, by saying: “What the hell has Hoover got to do with this? Anyway, I had a better year than he did.”

Page and his fellow members of the Vikings defensive line were known as the Purple People Eaters. He played in four Super Bowls, and was named most valuable player in 1971. He earned his law degree while playing football and after retiring in 1981, practiced full time until he won a seat on the Minnesota state Supreme Court in 1992, where he served for more than 20 years.

Staubach, a Naval Academy graduate and Heisman Trophy winner, played 11 seasons for the Cowboys, winning two Super Bowls. He was known for his scrambling style and ability to elude defenders. After football, Staubach had a successful career familiar to Trump. It was in commercial real estate.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Among medal of freedom honorees, a big donor stands out

Miriam Adelson. Adelson, a physician and philanthropist, is hardly a household name. But she is the wife of Sheldon Adelson, a casino magnate and multibillionaire.

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