President Trump announced during a news briefing that former Notre Dame football coach Lou Holtz, who was in the room, will receive the nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Trump said that he received many recommendations from athletes, coaches and other politicians to honor Holtz, and that he looked at those and Holtz’s “life, career, what he’s done for charity,” and determined that he deserved the honor.
Holtz spoke at the Republican National Convention and made headlines for challenging Biden’s faith, calling him a “Catholic in name only.” He also called the Biden-Harris ticket “the most radically pro-abortion campaign in history.”
Notre Dame distanced the school from Holtz’s comments, saying that “we Catholics should remind ourselves that while we may judge the objective moral quality of another’s actions, we must never question the sincerity of another’s faith, which is due to the mysterious working of grace in that person’s heart. In this fractious time, let us remember that our highest calling is to love.”