WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is welcoming Shohei Ohtani and the reigning World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers to the White House on Thursday with a Rose Garden event celebrating their second title in as many years.

The Dodgers edged the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 7 last October to become the first repeat champions in a quarter century. Trump feted the team in the White House East Room in April 2025 to mark their 2024 World Series championship

Sports teams visiting Trump at the White House have sometimes been a source of controversy dating to his first term. That includes 2018, when the president rescinded an invitation to the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles after many players suggested they might skip such a trip.

This time, Dodgers star right fielder Mookie Betts isn’t coming, saying he prefers to spend what is a scheduled day off for the team with his family — even though he did come for the 2025 visit. The team’s manager, Dave Roberts, suggested that the trip is more about winning than politics.

“My company line, my personal line, is, I hope that we get this invitation every year because that’s the goal, to win a championship, to get this invitation to the White House,” Roberts said Friday.

The Dodgers originally considered coming to the White House this past April during a series with the Washington Nationals, but a crowded early season schedule didn’t permit that. Instead, they’re in the nation’s capital during the off-day between a just-completed series at the Philadelphia Phillies and Friday’s opener against the New York Mets in Queens.

Championship baseball teams have been coming to the White House since 1869, when President Ulysses S. Grant hosted the Cincinnati Red Stockings. They were the first fully professional team to visit the White House and went undefeated that season, though the World Series wasn’t established in its modern form until 1903.

Since the Dodgers’ visit last year, Trump has revamped the Rose Garden and added a patio area reminiscent of his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.

Trump, a baseball fan and New York native, has for years been closely associated with the New York Yankees, whose late, longtime owner George Steinbrenner was a close friend. But the president singled out the New York Mets at a rally in Georgia on Wednesday, when he praised the ownership of the local Atlanta Braves and slammed the Mets for their sky-high payroll and losing record.

Trump was joined on stage during that event by former Braves manager Brian Snitker, and Mike Plant, president and CEO of the Braves Development Company.

“I like baseball,” Trump said before adding, ”You know, the Mets have the highest salary in baseball, and they lose all the time. And I’m like, maybe we can steal this guy.”

“There are teams like that, where they never go down,” Trump said. “Then you have other teams — ‘We’re rebuilding.’ They’ve been rebuilding for years. I don’t want to mention teams ’cause I know all the owners. They’re all friends of mine.”