Does Trump think Alexander Ovechkin is Canadian?
An odd moment from the Oval Office meeting: Donald Trump may be confused about the nationality of hockey’s greatest goal scorer.
Speaking about his love for Canada — “Canada is a very special place to me,” “I love Canada,” and so forth — Trump then transitioned to speaking about a notable Canadian.
“Wayne Gretzky, I mean how good, the Great One,” he said. (Gretzky and Trump are friends, an association for which Gretzky has caught some heat north of the border.)
But then Trump transitioned to talking about another hockey great.
“You happen to have a very, very good hockey player right here on the Capitals … a big tough cookie too, just broke the record, and he’s a great guy.”
Alexander Ovechkin, the Washington captain who broke Gretzky’s goal-scoring record last month, is decidedly not Canadian. He’s Russian, and a supporter of Vladimir Putin.
At the risk of overthinking this, it’s unclear if Trump saying, “You happen to have a very, very good hockey player right here” means he thinks Ovechkin is Canadian, or if he’s just using the royal “you” and talking about hockey players he knows in general.
But either way, it was an odd moment.
Carney, who usually never misses an opportunity to talk about hockey, didn’t intervene.
