Eighteen holes were all it took for President Trump to break with his Justice Department’s pursuit of fair prices for live event ticket purchasers.
Former prosecutor and GOP Rep. Trey Gowdy, after playing a round of golf with Trump on November 16, brought up a client of his that he claimed was being unfairly treated, according to sources of The Wall Street Journal.
Three weeks after that round of golf at Mar-a-Lago, Trump, 79, granted a pardon to Gowdy’s client, entertainment businessman Tim Leiweke.
The pardon, issued on Thursday, stomps on the Justice Department’s “airtight” case against Leiweke, 68, for allegedly rigging the bid for a $375 million basketball arena built for the University of Texas in 2018. It also hampers a separate civil case the Justice Department was pursuing to improve competition and pricing in the concert and sporting event industries.
Leiweke is accused of promising business to a company co-founded by Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones in exchange for the company’s agreement not to bid for the arena rights. Live Nation CEO Irving Azoff, who co-founded the sports and live-event company Oak View Group with Leiweke, acted as an intermediary for the rival firm.
The Justice Department granted Azoff immunity in the Texas arena case and made Leiweke the sole defendant in an effort to secure a conviction.
During his day on the Mar-a-Lago links, Gowdy, who boasts a 3.4 handicap, told Trump that Leiweke was being mistreated in the case. Gowdy tried to get Trump to pressure the DOJ into granting Leiweke a nonprosecution deal, like it had granted Azoff.
The president considered the case over the following weeks and, on Thursday, pardoned Leiweke in full.
Gowdy told the Journal he never sought a pardon, saying, “I am extremely grateful that the president allowed me to raise that issue with him, and he is the president, and whatever decision was made after that, he was elected to make, I was not.”
The White House told the publication, “President Trump is the final decider on any pardon or commutation and is exercising his constitutional authority to issue them as he deems necessary.”
The White House promised to combat price gouging in a March 2025 executive order. However, the order targeted scalpers, and not price-gouging corporations.
In 2024, the Justice Department filed a lawsuit accusing Live Nation and Ticketmaster of using their power to crush competition and drive up ticket prices. The case is the DOJ’s sole effort to improve competition and pricing in the concert and sports industries. The DOJ planned to use Leiweke’s indictment to pressure him into testifying in the antitrust case.
The pardon removes that pressure on Leiweke, and he signaled he will decline to cooperate with the Justice Department now that he’s off the hook, at least until a judge approves the dismissal of the case against him.
Live Nation has denied the Justice Department’s allegation that it is responsible for high ticket prices, saying it doesn’t have a monopoly and that artists and teams set ticket prices.
This wasn’t Gowdy’s first round of golf with the president. in August, Gowdy appeared on Fox News and gushed about the president’s game, saying he “hit every fairway” and cranked out impressive drives.
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