After Golfweek‘s Eamon Lynch wrote in a column Saturday that the PGA of America was likely to move the 2022 PGA Championship away from Trump National in Bedminster, New Jersey following the latest wave of controversy around U.S. president Donald Trump and his role in encouraging the storming of the Capitol Building, the organization has done just that. Here’s the statement they put out Sunday night:
"The PGA of America Board of Directors voted tonight to exercise the right to terminate the agreement to play the 2022 PGA Championship at Trump Bedminster." — Jim Richerson, PGA of America President
— PGA of America (@PGA) January 11, 2021
The timing here is interesting. It initially seemed like if this move was in fact coming, the PGA might only make it after the inauguration of Joe Biden on Jan. 20. And Lynch’s piece read more as a prediction and an opinion than a report; that piece said that “The odds that ’22’s PGA Championship will happen as scheduled in New Jersey are about as good as the chances of you or I winning it,” but suggested an actual move might take a while: “Moving its major from Trump National has been debated internally at the PGA for more than two years, but executives have been reluctant to antagonize a famously vindictive man who controls the Internal Revenue Service. Such concerns melt away in 10 days, if not sooner.”
However, a NJ.com piece from Kevin Manahan Sunday morning that was confirmed as just aggregating Lynch’s piece rather than offering new reporting substantially boosted the Twitter discussion that this was actually happening, especially with the headline of “PGA will strip Trump Bedminster.” And that led to a lot of people, including some involved with political advocacy group The Lincoln Project, claiming not only that this was a fait accompli, but also taking credit for it. And perhaps all that Twitter talk led to the PGA of America either making this decision or making it sooner than they might have otherwise; we don’t really know. But it is official now that the PGA of America will relocate the 2022 championship. And that’s notable, as these moves are rarely made, especially around majors; the PGA Championship is otherwise scheduled out through 2034. We’ll see where the 2022 edition winds up, but we now know that it won’t be at Trump National in Bedminster.
