President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday alongside a coterie of current and retired professional athletes to bring the presidential fitness test back to U.S. schools — a national test of physical performance that had been administered inside school gyms across the country for decades.
“I’m pleased to announce that we’re officially restoring the presidential fitness test and the presidential fitness award,” Trump said at a White House signing ceremony. “From the late 1950s until … 2013 … scholars all across our country competed against each other in the presidential fitness test, and it was a big deal. This was a wonderful tradition, and we’re bringing it back.”
A version of the test was first deployed during Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidential administration. For decades, it pushed children across the country to do 40 push-ups, 10 pull-ups and a 6½-minute mile. The Obama administration disbanded the test in 2012, replacing it with a program focused on overall health instead of athleticism.
Several high-profile athletes — all of whom have existing ties to Trump — attended the ceremony and will serve on the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition. The attendees included professional golfer Bryson DeChambeau, who will chair the council; controversial National Football League kicker Harrison Butker; World Wrestling Entertainment mainstay Paul “Triple H” Levesque; golfer Annika Sorenstam; and football Hall of Famer Lawrence Taylor.
DeChambeau has represented the Trump Golf brand for several years. Trump awarded Sorenstam the Medal of Freedom in a ceremony that took place less than 24 hours after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Levesque is married to Stephanie McMahon, the daughter of Education Secretary Linda McMahon. Taylor campaigned for Trump last year.
Butker, whose commencement address last year went viral, in part, for his denunciation of the “diabolical lies told” to women and “dangerous gender ideologies,” later endorsed Trump and visited the White House in February after his team, the Kansas City Chiefs, lost the Super Bowl.
Trump also announced the names of several additional council members who were not in attendance, mostly current or retired athletes. The other council members include golfers Jack Nicklaus, Nelly Korda and Gary Player (who was also awarded the Medal of Freedom alongside Sorenstam); football players Tony Romo, Nick Bosa and Saquon Barkley; hockey player Wayne Gretzky; and baseball player Mariano Rivera. Notably, the list also includes NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, whom Trump repeatedly scrutinized during his first presidential term.
A White House official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview the president’s announcement ahead of Thursday’s signing said that Trump was seeking to combat “the widespread epidemic of declining health and physical fitness with a time-tested approach celebrating the exceptionalism of America’s sports and fitness traditions.” The official cited “crisis levels” of obesity, poor nutrition and inactivity as reasons for the move and said, “These trends weaken our economy, military readiness, academic performance and national morale.”
At Thursday’s ceremony alongside Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump deployed his Cabinet member’s catchphrase, saying the resurrection of the test was “an important step in our mission to ‘Make America Healthy Again.’”
Trump is not the only conservative pushing for more physical activity in schools.
Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, a Trump ally who ran against him in the 2024 GOP presidential primary, has been campaigning to bring back the test in the Buckeye State.
Responding to the news of Trump’s action to bring the test back nationally on Thursday, Ramaswamy wrote on X, “Great to see the Presidential Fitness Test making a comeback. Good health habits & the pursuit of achievement start at a young age. We’ll lead the way in Ohio.”
