Rob Manfred says he discussed Pete
Rose's status with Donald Trump and will rule on reinstatement
[April 29, 2025]
By JAKE SEINER
NEW YORK (AP) — Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred said he discussed
Pete Rose with President Donald Trump at a meeting two weeks ago and
he plans to rule on a request to end the sport's permanent ban of
the career hits leader, who died in September.
Speaking Monday at a meeting of the Associated Press Sports Editors,
Manfred said he and Trump have discussed several issues, including
Manfred's concerns over how Trump's immigration policies could
impact players from Cuba, Venezuela and other foreign countries.
Manfred is considering a petition to have Rose posthumously removed
from MLB's permanently ineligible list. The petition was filed in
January by Jeffrey Lenkov, a Southern California lawyer who
represented Rose prior to the 17-time All-Star's death at age 83.
“I met with President Trump two weeks ago, I guess now, and one of
the topics was Pete Rose, but I’m not going beyond that," Manfred
said. "He’s said what he said publicly, I’m not going beyond that in
terms of what the back and forth was.”
Trump posted on social media Feb. 28 that he plans to issue “a
complete PARDON of Pete Rose.” Trump posted on Truth Social that
Rose “shouldn’t have been gambling on baseball, but only bet on HIS
TEAM WINNING.” It's unclear what a presidential pardon might include
— Trump did not specifically mention a tax case in which Rose
pleaded guilty in 1990 to two counts of filing false tax returns and
served a five-month prison sentence.
The president said he would sign a pardon for Rose “over the next
few weeks" but has not addressed the matter since.
Rose had 4,256 hits and also holds records for games (3,562) and
plate appearances (15,890). He was the 1973 National League MVP and
played on three World Series winners.
An investigation for MLB by lawyer John M. Dowd found Rose placed
numerous bets on the Cincinnati Reds to win from 1985-87 while
playing for and managing the team. Rose agreed with MLB on a
permanent ban in 1989.
Lenkov is seeking Rose's reinstatement so that he can be considered
for the Hall of Fame. Under a rule adopted by the Hall’s board of
directors in 1991, anyone on the permanently ineligible list can’t
be considered for election to the Hall. Rose applied for
reinstatement in 1997 and met with Commissioner Bud Selig in
November 2002, but Selig never ruled on Rose’s request. Manfred in
2015 denied Rose’s application for reinstatement.
Manfred said reinstating Rose now was “a little more complicated
than it might appear on the outside" and did not commit to a
timeline except that “I want to get it done promptly as soon as we
get the work done.”
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MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred speaks at the SBJ CAA World Congress of
Sport, Tuesday, April 22, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George
Walker IV)
“I’m not going to give this the pocket veto," he
said. "I will in fact issue a ruling.”
Rose's reinstatement doesn't mean he would automatically appear on a
Hall of Fame ballot. He would first have to be nominated by the
Hall's Historical Overview Committee, which is picked by the
Baseball Writers’ Association of America and approved by the Hall's
board. Manfred is an ex-officio member of that board and says he has
been in regular contact with chairman Jane Forbes Clark.
“I mean, believe me, a lot of Hall of Fame dialogue on this one,"
Manfred said.
If reinstated, Rose potentially would be eligible for consideration
to be placed on a ballot to be considered by the 16-member Classic
Baseball Era committee in December 2027.
Manfred added he doesn't think baseball's current ties to legal
sports betting should color views on Rose's case.
“There is and always has been a clear demarcation between what Rob
Manfred, ordinary citizen, can do on the one hand, and what someone
who has the privilege to play or work in Major League Baseball can
do on the other in respect to gambling," he said. "The fact that the
law changed, and we sell data and/or sponsorships, which is
essentially all we do, to sports betting enterprises, I don’t think
changes that. It’s a privilege to play Major League Baseball. As
with every privilege, there comes responsibilities. One of those
responsibilities is that they not bet on the game.”
Manfred did not go into details on his discussion with Trump over
foreign-born players other than to say he expressed worry.
"Given the number of foreign-born players we have, we're always
concerned about ingress and egress," Manfred said. "We have had
dialogue with the administration about this topic. And, you know,
they're very interested in sports. They understand the unique need
to be able to go back and forth, and I'm going to leave it at that.”
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