Dennis Rodman isn’t on an official White House visit to North Korea, but the NBA Hall of Famer on Thursday still managed to deliver a message from President Trump, presenting a top government official with a copy of “The Art of the Deal.”
He gave an unsigned copy of Trump’s best-selling book to Sports Minister Kim Il Guk with the intention that he would pass it along to President Kim Jong Un.
Earlier, Rodman, who appeared in Trump’s show “Celebrity Apprentice,” visited with a group of North Korean basketball players.
“All of you guys should be proud of yourselves, because, you know, a lot of people don’t give you guys credit, because this is such a small country, and not many people from North Korea can compete around the world,” he told them. “But for you guys to come back here in your country, with a medal, that says a lot about North Korea, because people don’t really take North Korea so seriously about sports or anything like that.”
The sports minister lavished praise on Rodman, who’s on his fifth visit to the country and is one of the few Americans to have met the North Korean leader.
“In the past, our respected supreme leader met you several times and he used his precious time to watch the basketball match with the players you brought here.
“In the past he met you, so our people all know you well,” he told Rodman. “And also we feel that you are an old friend.”
Rodman arrived in North Korea on Tuesday, just hours after it had released Otto Warmbier, an American university student serving 15 years of hard labor for stealing a propaganda banner while visiting the country in January 2016.
North Korea said it released Warmbier, who had been in a coma for more than a year, for “humanitarian reasons.”
Along with “The Art of the Deal,” Rodman presented a copy of “Where’s Waldo? The Totally Essential Travel Collection,” a mermaid puzzle, two sets of soap and two autographed jerseys.