Spike Lee Says the Knicks Won't Go to Trump's White House. James Dolan Wants a Word

The New York Knicks won the 2026 NBA championship in June, beating the San Antonio Spurs and losing exactly one game, their first title since 1973. Fifty-three years is a long time to wait for anything. People have been born, married and buried in that span, some of them in the cheap seats at the Garden. You'd think the city would still be enjoying it. Instead, five months later, it's arguing about whether to go to the White House.

Owner James Dolan, a friend of the president's, accepted the invitation back in June. Whether the players will actually go is another matter, and over the weekend Spike Lee, who has sat courtside for longer than some of the players have been alive, told Variety where he stands. Dolan 'can't force them,' Lee said. 'They're not going. I hope they don't go!' Then he added a theory. Trump attended Game 3 of the Finals, the Knicks' only loss of the series, and Lee said that 'was not just an accident!'

Now, I don't know that a president can jinx a basketball game. But I also know New York fans, and if you told them a man in a red tie walked into the Garden and the team lost that night, they'd believe it faster than the weather report. Sports fans are the most superstitious people on earth. They'll wear the same socks for a month and call it strategy.

The trouble is that Lee and Dolan have history, and none of it's warm. In 2020, Lee announced he was done with the season after a fight with Garden security over the employee entrance he'd been using for years, and the team put out a statement calling the idea that he was the victim laughable. So this isn't a debate. It's a marriage, and the White House trip is just the latest thing on the kitchen table. Stephen A. Smith, never one to whisper, called Dolan 'a walking embodiment of petulance' last week and wondered if the owner would hold a grudge against players who say no.

The players, for their part, haven't said much, and it does not appear they want to go. That's the wisest position in the whole affair. You win the title, you ride the parade, and you let the owner and the movie director fight in public while you count your ring size. Lee will be courtside either way, and so will Dolan, about fifty feet apart, as usual. In New York, they say you can pick your friends, but you can't pick your owner, and the owner can't pick who sits courtside. It's the only real democracy left in the city.