\n<\/p>\n
Saquon Barkley has declined an invitation to join Donald Trump\u2019s council on sports, fitness, and nutrition, which is being revitalized under an executive order.<\/p>\n
Barkley, the 2,000-yard rusher for the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, was on a list of sports personalities that included golfers Bryson DeChambeau and Nelly Korda, WWE executive Paul \u201cTriple H\u201d Levesque, football Hall of Famer Lawrence Taylor and retired New York Yankees great Mariano Rivera.<\/p>\n
Barkley confirmed on Monday that he had declined the invitation.<\/p>\n
\u201cA couple months ago, it was brought to my team about the council,\u201d Barkley told reporters after Monday\u2019s Eagles practice session. \u201cSo I\u2019m not really too familiar with it. I felt like that I am going to be super busy. Me and my family thought it would probably be of best interest to not accept that. I was definitely a little shocked when my name was mentioned. I\u2019m assuming it\u2019s something great, so I appreciate it but was a little shocked when my name was mentioned.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump last week reestablished the Presidential Fitness Test for American children, a fixture of public schools for decades that gauged young people\u2019s health and athleticism with one-mile runs, sit-ups and stretching exercises.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a wonderful tradition, and we\u2019re bringing it back,\u201d Trump said of the fitness test that began in 1966 but was phased out during the Obama administration.<\/p>\n
The executive order also reinvigorated the national sports council that could have included Barkley. Barkley won AP Offensive Player of the Year last season after rushing for 2,005 yards, eighth-best in NFL history, in his first season with the Eagles.<\/p>\n
Barkley has golfed with Trump and Barack Obama over the last year and the running back attended the White House celebration of the champion Eagles while some teammates \u2013 notably star quarterback Jalen Hurts \u2013 skipped the ceremony.<\/p>\n
Barkley visited Trump in April at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, and caught a ride with the president to Washington on Air Force One and then to the White House on Marine One.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe loved it,\u201d Trump said then of Barkley\u2019s short flight on the presidential airplane. \u201cHe\u2019s a great young guy and an incredible football player. Saquon had a season for the ages, running behind the most powerful offensive line in the NFL.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barkley, meanwhile, pushed back on social media criticism following the visit. He noted that he had already golfed with Obama.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe I just respect the office, not a hard concept to understand,\u201d Barkley posted on X.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Saquon Barkley has declined an invitation to join Donald Trump\u2019s council on sports, fitness, and nutrition, which is being revitalized under an executive order. Barkley, the 2,000-yard rusher for the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, was on a list of sports personalities that included golfers Bryson DeChambeau and Nelly Korda, WWE executive Paul \u201cTriple H\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14123,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[7767,914,7768,7765,7769,6887,7766,7770,992,622,71],"class_list":{"0":"post-14122","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-barkley","9":"tag-council","10":"tag-declines","11":"tag-eagles","12":"tag-invitation","13":"tag-philadelphia","14":"tag-saquon","15":"tag-serve","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-star","18":"tag-trumps"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}