The 2027 NFL Draft is coming to the National Mall at the invitation of President Donald Trump.
The 78-year-old football fan made the announcement Monday at the White House alongside NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, Washington Commanders owner Josh Harris, Democrat DC Mayor Muriel Bowser and Housing Secretary Scott Turner, a former Redskins defensive back.
Trump and Bowser were previously at odds over a number of local issues, but the pair appeared jovial for much of Monday’s announcement from the Oval Office.
‘I don’t think there’s ever been in anything like that,’ Trump said of staging the draft on the National Mall. ‘That’s a good idea… Maybe we could use it for other things also
Trump’s desk was scattered with personalized Washington football memorabilia, including a ‘Trump’ No. 47 replica jersey.
The venue is capable of holding several hundred thousands spectators, although the exact capacity for the 2027 NFL Draft has yet to be announced.
District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser, from right, speaks as NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and Washington Commanders owner Josh Harris are pictured in the Oval Office
Donald Trump glances at NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, the son of a Republican senator
The plan is for the draft to be held at Washington’s iconic National Mall in two years’ time
‘The Mall can actually hold up to a million people,’ Trump noted.
Washington DC has never hosted the event since it began changing venues in 2015. Previously the draft was primarily held in New York and Philadelphia. Last week’s NFL Draft was held in Green Bay, while the 2026 showpiece is being staged in Pittsburgh.
Washington was selected as draft hosts just days after Bowser announced a plan to bring the team back to the city with a new arena on the site of the old RFK Stadium, where the team played until 1996.
Currently, RFK Stadium stands on the site on the banks of the Anacostia River in the eastern part of the city. The building has been in the process of a prolonged demolition that has been delayed multiple times.
The building was closed back in September 2019, but structural demolition has only begun this year.
‘And I don’t think there is a better site anywhere in the world than that site,’ Trump said before taking credit for the plan. ‘It sat there for years and people were talking about stadiums and 25 different sites. I said they’re not talking about the best site. That’s the best site there is.’
The announcement from Harris and Bowser came with renderings of what the new stadium might look like – including a clear West-facing façade that offers views straight up East Capitol Street NE toward the US Capitol building and the Washington Monument.
The planned construction will see a roof added onto the building, allowing it to be a possible venue for a future Super Bowl.
Although not attached to an actual game, the NFL Draft has become a major annual event and even drew 600,000 fans to Green Bay, the NFL’s smallest market, last month.
And it’s even more popular on television, where former Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders’ dramatic fall from a projected first-round pick to the 144th selection captivated audiences for three days. According to a league statement, an average of 7.3 million viewers watched second- and third-round coverage on Friday night, which marked a 40-percent increase from 2024.
Trump, himself, couldn’t resist the draft’s spotlight and blasted NFL owners online for passing over NFL legend and Colorado coach Deion Sanders’s on.
‘What is wrong with NFL owners, are they STUPID?’ Trump wrote on Truth Social. ‘Deion Sanders was a great college football player, and was even greater in the NFL. He’s also a very good coach, streetwise and smart!
‘Therefore, Shedeur, his quarterback son, has PHENOMENAL GENES, and is all set for Greatness. He should be ”picked” IMMEDIATELY by a team that wants to WIN. Good luck Shedeur, and say hello to your wonderful father!’
Shedeur Sanders was drafted by the Browns, which Trump’s White House credits to POTUS
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about Sanders’ draft pick Monday
Trump is seen as Generals owner alongside running back and future ally Herschel Walker
Trump’s message came after the first day of the draft. Sanders would ultimately wait until the third day to be picked by the Cleveland Browns, prompting the President’s press secretary to take credit for his entry into the NFL.
‘All I will say is the president put out a statement, and a few rounds later he was drafted, so I think the facts speak for themselves,’ a grinning White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters last month.
Trump has a complicated history with the NFL.
He was critical of Goodell and the NFL during his first term as players protested racist police brutality by kneeling during the national anthem.
Before picking the Kansas City Chiefs to win February’s Super Bowl, the 78-year-old made several doomed attempts at becoming an NFL team owner.
In 1983, Trump expressed an interest in buying the Baltimore Colts, who weren’t ultimately sold but were relocated to Indianapolis.
A year later, Trump had a reported chance to buy the Dallas Cowboys for just $50 million but declined, allowing Jerry Jones to acquire the franchise for $140 million later in the decade. Now the Cowboys rank as the most valuable team in sports with a $9 billion valuation from Forbes.
And Trump wasn’t only using money to get an NFL team. He also tried using leverage, according to Jeff Pearlman’s 2018 book, ‘Football for a Buck: The Crazy Rise and Crazier Demise of the USFL.
Late NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle reportedly told Trump he would never own a league team
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Launched in 1983, the USFL was a spring football league that boasted a surprising array of talent, including future Trump political ally Herschel Walker. One year into the league, Trump would buy Walker’s team, the New Jersey Generals, which he’d own until the league went bust in 1986.
The USFL’s abbreviated history is defined by several clear mistakes, like the decision to add six new franchises after a promising inaugural season in 1983. But perhaps the bigger misstep was choosing to move its season to the fall in 1985 and challenge the NFL directly – a decision that was influenced heavily by Trump.
‘In the lead-up to buying the team, he was all about spring football and how great the league was, and, ‘I love what the USFL is doing and blah blah blah,’ Pearlman told DailyMail.com in 2018. ‘He gets approved as an owner, he buys the team, and immediately: ‘We need to move to fall; we need to take on the NFL.’
‘His big line was: ‘If God wanted football in the spring, he wouldn’t have invented baseball.”
According to interviews conducted by Pearlman, Trump’s initial plan was to have the USFL fold and the NFL absorb the Generals as an expansion franchise.
However, during a meeting with then-NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle in New York City’s Pierre Hotel in 1984, that plan was foiled.
‘He basically said to Rozelle,’ Pearlman explained, ”I don’t really give a s*** about the USFL. I want an NFL team. What do I have to do to get in the NFL?”
‘It was basically an offer to throw the USFL under the bus.’
Trump did not get the answer he was looking for.
‘Rozelle said to him, ‘As long as I’m the commissioner, you’re never going to have a team,” Pearlman continued. ‘He didn’t trust him. He thought he was a scumbag. He didn’t say, ‘I think you’re a scumbag,’ but Rozelle made his feelings toward Trump very well known. [Rozelle] also made them well known during the trial when he testified.’