Trump's New Cause du Jour: Pete Rose

President wants disgraced MLB slugger reinstated, let into the baseball Hall of Fame
By Polly Davis Doig,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 9, 2020 8:53 AM CST
Trump: Get Pete Rose in the Hall of Fame
In this 2017 file photo, former Cincinnati Reds player Pete Rose attends a news conference during his statue dedication ceremonies before a baseball game between the Reds and the Los Angeles Dodgers in Cincinnati.   (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

Fresh off the "hell" that was his impeachment trial, President Trump is apparently taking up the cause of another man he feels was unjustly persecuted: disgraced baseball great Pete Rose, currently barred from the Hall of Fame because of a lifetime ban that's been in place since 1989. The commander in chief isn't having it, reports WLWT. Tweeteth he: "Pete Rose played Major League Baseball for 24 seasons, from 1963-1986, and had more hits, 4,256, than any other player (by a wide margin). He gambled, but only on his own team winning, and paid a decades long price. GET PETE ROSE INTO THE BASEBALL HALL OF FAME. It’s Time!"

The 78-year-old Rose is currently petitioning MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred for reinstatement, arguing that his lifetime ban is "vastly disproportionate" to the punishments handed out to more modern players who stole signs or used steroids. "There cannot be one set of rules for Mr. Rose and another for everyone else. No objective standard or categorization of the rules violations committed by Mr. Rose can distinguish his violations from those that have incurred substantially less severe penalties from Major League Baseball," reads the new petition, per ESPN. (More Pete Rose stories.)

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