President Donald Trump lashed out at Oklahoma Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt on Wednesday over a dispute regarding an upcoming governors’ event at the White House.
Stitt told NGA members on Friday that the National Governors Association, which he chairs, would no longer list a formal meeting with Trump on its agenda for the NGA’s historically bipartisan governors’ weekend in Washington. That came after the White House informed the NGA that only Republicans would be included in the association's annual business meeting, scheduled to take place Feb. 20.
But in a Wednesday social media post, Trump said Stitt’s assertion that the White House intended to exclude Democratic governors from the business meeting was “false.”
“The RINO Governor of the Great State of Oklahoma, in which I won all 77 Counties, three times (The only person to do so!), incorrectly stated my position on the very exclusive Governors Annual Dinner and Meeting at the White House,” Trump wrote of Stitt on Wednesday. “The invitations were sent to ALL Governors, other than two, who I feel are not worthy of being there.”
Trump, in the post, defended his decision to exclude two Democratic governors — Wes Moore of Maryland and Jared Polis of Colorado — from the meeting. However, adding to the confusion, a person close to Moore said the Maryland governor received an invitation Wednesday to the meeting prior to Trump's social media post.
Stitt sent an additional letter to governors on Wednesday informing members that all states would be invited to the business meeting after speaking with Trump, according to a copy of the letter reviewed by POLITICO.
After Stitt’s conversation with the president, some Democratic governors began receiving invitations to the business meeting, said a person familiar with the matter, granted anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak on the record.
Abegail Cave, a spokesperson for Stitt’s office, said the Oklahoma governor “looks forward to the rest of his colleagues receiving their invitations today.”
Spokespeople from the offices of Polis and Moore did not immediately respond to a request for comment; nor did a spokesperson for the Democratic Governors Association.
“We are hopeful that we can have constructive bipartisan dialogue with the President during the session,” Brandon Tatum, the NGA’s acting executive director and CEO, said in a statement. “Continuing the tradition of the business meeting is an important step toward bridge building among parties.”
More than a dozen Democratic governors announced Tuesday that they would boycott a bipartisan dinner at the White House over Trump’s move to exclude Polis and Moore from the weekend's events.
“I look forward to seeing the Republican Governors, and some of the Democrats Governors who were worthy of being invited, but most of whom won’t show up,” Trump wrote.
He went on to attack Polis over the jailing of former Colorado county clerk Tina Peters, who was sentenced to nine years in state prison in 2024 over efforts to undermine the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Trump has repeatedly criticized Colorado officials over the case, writing in a December post that Polis and the district attorney who charged Peters should “rot in Hell.” Trump signed a formal pardon for Peters last year, although Democrats in the state argued the president cannot grant clemency for state charges.
He also alleged that Moore, whom he called “the foul mouthed Governor of Maryland,” lied about receiving military medals and “has allowed Baltimore to continue to be a Crime Disaster,” also criticizing the Democrat for his role overseeing the rebuilding of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which collapsed nearly a year ago.
Moore, the association’s vice chair, attracted criticism during his 2022 gubernatorial campaign for not correcting two television interviewers who had introduced him as a recipient of a Bronze Star medal, an award he claimed to have received on an application for a White House fellowship in 2006. He has since called the incident “an honest mistake.”
Moore — the only sitting Black governor in the country — also suggested on Sunday that his race may have played a role in the White House’s decision to exclude him.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended Trump’s move on Tuesday, telling reporters that “the president has the discretion to invite whomever he wants to the White House.”
Stitt, who is term-limited and cannot seek reelection when his governorship expires in 2027, has faced a delicate challenge in leading the bipartisan NGA during the Trump administration, with tensions between leadership and the group’s Democratic governors boiling over into the public eye on several occasions.
In October, Stitt broke with his party in criticizing the Trump administration’s cross-state deployment of National Guard troops, but Democrats have demanded the organization push back more forcefully on the president’s incursions into blue states.
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