Longstanding accusations of President Donald Trump cheating at golf have resurfaced after a video of him in Scotland over the weekend went viral.
In his book, Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains Trump, Rick Reilly alleged the American president’s conduct on the course was far from exemplary.
“Trump doesn’t just cheat at golf,” the author wrote. “He cheats like a three-card monte dealer. He throws it, boots it and moves it. He lies about his lies. He fudges and foozles and fluffs.”
Now a video has emerged from the president’s trip to Scotland that may support his thesis.
Taken during a weekend round at his Turnberry course, the video shows Trump parking a golf buggy near a bunker and a large portion of rough.
Walking ahead of the buggy are two caddies. As the US president prepares to get out of the buggy, one of them can be seen stooping down and dropping a ball onto a patch of short grass just before the start of the rough. Trump then uses that ball to take his next shot.
Claiming to have found a lost ball in a favorable position and surreptitiously dropping a replacement there — sometimes known as “the trouser leg” — is a well-known golf cheating technique.
Two weeks ago John Nieporte, head professional at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, and a caddie, denied to The Times that the president was a cheat. (Read his interview in full).
“The proof’s in the pudding,” Nieporte said, pointing to the US president’s competition record. “I’ve seen him win club championships sinking 60ft putts. I’ve seen him shoot 66 out here on this golf course [in West Palm Beach].”
Reilly’s book accused Trump of kicking balls from the rough into the fairway, instructing his caddies to throw opponents’ balls into bunkers and awarding himself a large number of “gimme putts”, where a player picks up their ball, rather than putting it, because the distance is so short.
Although Nieporte admitted the president would sometimes move onto the next hole without sinking his gimme putts, this was because the president had a “tight schedule” and could not be on the course for “hours and hours”, he said. Instead he would “give a putt here and there”.
Neither Trump nor the White House have commented on the video.
WATCH THE VIDEOS BELOW:
🚨🏴⛳️ #WATCH — A caddie was seen dropping a ball for President Donald Trump during his Scotland golf trip.
Did he make par?pic.twitter.com/HgKuzHFXHa
— NUCLR GOLF (@NUCLRGOLF) July 27, 2025

There’s good reason why the caddies a Trump’s Jersey club called him “Pele,” after the world best kicker of a ball.