Donald Trump is fangirling over a fellow convicted felon.
The president, 79, touted a letter he received from the late Yankees owner George M. Steinbrenner—a convicted felon who funneled illegal corporate contributions to the 1972 reelection effort of controversial President Richard Nixon—in a Truth Social post on Sunday.
In a 1989 letter on New York Yankees stationery—the same year Steinbrenner received a presidential pardon—the businessman fawned over Trump after seeing him appear on The Morton Downey Jr. Show.
“Saw you on Morton Downey the other night. He is a friend, and I watch his show regularly,” Steinbrenner, who died in 2010 at age 80, wrote.
“You were great! You tell it like it is,” he continued. “It is like I said to Stephen, you should run for President someday and get the whole dam thing straightened out. You were tremendous on the show.”
Steinbrenner, who made his fortune in shipping and purchased the New York Yankees for $10 million in 1973, pleaded guilty in 1974 to a felony count of violating federal campaign laws and paid a $15,000 fine, according to reporting by the New York Daily News.
The baseball owner had made an illegal $100,000 contribution to Nixon’s campaign fund before the president was later ousted in the Watergate scandal.
Steinbrenner avoided jail time but paid a $15,000 fine. Then, he spent upwards of a decade petitioning the White House for a pardon before succeeding in the eleventh hour of Ronald Reagan’s second term.
Trump, too, avoided prison after being convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to conceal a hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels.
But while Steinbrenner was banned from the day-to-day management of his beloved Yankees, Trump’s punishment proved far less lasting: He eventually returned to the Oval Office.
New Yorkers have long drawn comparisons between Trump and Steinbrenner. Both were born to immigrant mothers and raised by domineering fathers who built the family fortunes. In 2017, New York Post columnist Steve Serby asked Yankees general manager Brian Cashman about the parallels. “They do it their way, and take no prisoners. I think they’re very similar,” he said.
In 2002, The New Yorker observed that “Steinbrenner’s hero is George Patton,” a figure the president has also expressed admiration for. Trump’s longtime mentor, Manhattan attorney Roy Cohn, was also a counselor to—and friend of—Steinbrenner.
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House for comment.
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