Donald Trump resurrected the specter of the late Penn State football coach Joe Paterno at a campaign event in Pittsburgh on Wednesday.
After saying he knows a lot about Pennsylvania, Trump asked the crowd, “How’s Joe Paterno? We gonna bring that back? Right? How about that whole deal?”
Paterno, nicknamed “JoePa,” was the football coach of the Penn State Nittany Lions football team from 1966 to 2011 where he became the winningest coach in major college football history. His career ended abruptly when he came under fire for allegedly helping to cover up a child sex scandal involving Jerry Sandusky, a former assistant coach. Sandusky was convicted and sentenced 30 to 60 years in prison.
Two months after he was fired from Penn State, Paterno died at the age of 85 after being diagnosed with lung cancer. Paterno’s family has maintained the former coach’s innocence.
While some in the media chided Trump for floating the idea of bringing Paterno back from the grave, the billionaire candidate’s campaign reportedly clarified his remarks by saying Trump was talking about bringing back the bronze statue of Joe Paterno that once stood in front of Penn State’s Beaver Stadium. It was removed in 2012 following the release of a report by former FBI director Louis Freeh in which he concluded that Paterno, along with three university officials, played a role concealing the scandal.
NOTE: A previous article incorrectly stated that the Paterno statue was melted down and used for lettering on a campus building.
