Coronavirus: US president Donald Trump responds to Rory McIlroy criticism
- Rory McIlroy's criticism of Donald Trump has drawn a response from the president of the United States.
![mcilroytrump - Cropped](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 800 450"></svg>)
Donald Trump responded to Rory McIlroy's vow never to play golf with the United States president again, saying a lot of golfers "like my politics very much and some don't, I guess".
World number one McIlroy last week criticised Trump's response to the coronavirus pandemic in the United States, accusing him of trying to "politicise" the crisis.
"We're in the midst of something that's pretty serious right now," McIlroy told the McKellar Golf Podcast.
"He's trying to politicise it and make it a campaign rally, saying that [the US] administers the most tests in the world like it's a contest.
"It's just not the way a leader should act and there is a bit of diplomacy that you need to show, and I just don't think he's shown that, especially in these times."
Thank you! #DrivingRelief pic.twitter.com/YUVqXodzjx
— Rory McIlroy (@McIlroyRory) May 17, 2020
McIlroy drew criticism for playing a round with Trump in 2017 at his International Golf Club in Florida but said he would not do so again in the future.
Trump, phoning in to NBC's coverage of a charity TaylorMade Driving Relief skins match that saw McIlroy and Dustin Johnson defeat Rickie Fowler and Matthew Wolff, had his say on the comments.
"A lot of them [golfers] are very political, actually. A lot of them like my politics very much and some don't, I guess," he said.
"The ones that don't I don't get to see as much."
There have been 1,527,951 confirmed cases of coronavirus in America, with 90,980 having died after testing positive.
