RUSSIA/SPORTS/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “A day after President Trump reveled in the apparent fizzling of a two-year effort to prosecute him for possible illicit coordination with Russia during the 2016 campaign, Washington’s most prominent Moscow native arrived at the White House on Monday [3-25-19] to celebrate. The milestone? A hockey championship. Some members of the Washington Capitals, who won their first Stanley Cup title in June, boycotted the White House event in their honor, which included a private tour and a meeting with the president in the Oval Office. But not Alex Ovechkin, the team’s Russian captain and the National Hockey League’s most valuable player, who is also a vocal admirer and personal friend of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. Mr. Ovechkin was not the only Russian player in the Oval Office on Monday. He was joined there by two teammates: Evgeny Kuznetsov, a forward, and Dmitry Orlov, a defenseman, who were part of a 55-member Capitals delegation, the first from a Washington team to visit the White House since the Washington Redskins won the Super Bowl in 1992.”
–Annie Karni, “Washington’s Most Popular Russian (and His Teammates) Honored at White House,” The New York Times online, March 25, 2019