Donald Trump, Linda McMahon vow winning Long Island mascot fight is a ‘top priority’

The Massapequa Chiefs have a fan in the commander in chief.

The Trump administration has vowed it is a “top priority” to protect the Massapequa High School’s Native American logo — as the president himself boasted about his deep admiration for the Long Island town and its fight to protect its heritage.

“I love Massapequa. I’ve heard that name for years,” Trump recently told Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade, a proud product of the hamlet.

“I have a lot of friends in Massapequa … We’ve got to get the name back to the Chiefs,” the president, who previously posed with a Massapequa sweatshirt in the Oval Office, added.

He said removing mascot names like Chiefs, or in the case of fellow Long Island district Connetquot, which is embattled over the use of Thunderbirds, is “demeaning” to Native Americans.

“It is a top priority of this Administration to protect Massapequa, Connetquot, and all Native American groups’ right to celebrate and preserve their cultural heritage,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon, who in May found removing the logos to be a civil rights violation, said in a statement to The Post.

McMahon, who announced the Title XI breach from Massapequa High School’s gym at the time, praised the two districts “in their continued fight against woke ideologues who are attempting to strip them of their beloved Chiefs and Thunderbirds mascots.”

“We will never back down — we will always be the Massapequa Chiefs,” school board president Kerry Wachter vowed this week of the community that is “proud” to have federal intervention and support.

Since the Trump administration’s spring intervention, the Chiefs have had a renewed legal battle under new counsel, Massapequa-born lawyer and Harvard grad Oliver Roberts.

“The state is fighting us very hard,” said the president, who visited and was across from its high school for the wake of slain NYPD officer Jonathan Diller in March 2024.

“But I think we’ll be successful with it,” added Trump, who is outwardly fond of the iconic Massapequa burger joint All American and lauded the town’s “championship” caliber athletics last week.

McMahon doubled down, criticizing that other ethnic team names — Seaford, the town west of Massapequa, is the Vikings — face no scrutiny from the New York Board of Regents’ 2023-enacted ban solely targeting Native names and logos.

“We will not allow New York education leaders to continue violating the Civil Rights Act by inconsistently and unlawfully deeming some national-origin-based mascots as acceptable while determining others are not,” she added.

How Long Island can win

Roberts, who said New York’s position is “sad and disgraceful,” explained that the South Shore town .

Massapequa and the Native American Guardians Association, which, in a contract, permitted the district to keep Chiefs, have separate ongoing legal action against the state.

Thirdly, Wachter asked Trump to ink an executive order on behalf of the conservative town he adores.

However, Connetquot’s fight hit turbulence after local education officials reversed course from initial legal action to keep Thunderbirds in the district that McMahon launched a July federal investigation into.

It quietly allocated over $23M to phase out the title and were in talks out of public purview with New York to compromise with shortened T-Birds in exchange for dropping legal action.

T-Birds, which is already used frequently in the school system, was initially disallowed by the ban.

New York altered course after federal scrutiny came along.

“To turn around, settle, and say ‘T-Bird — that’s no longer discriminatory,’ while it was two years ago, makes no sense,” Connetquot board member Jacquelyn DiLorenzo told The Post of dropping Thunderbirds.

“I think it’s crazy and just political … I do feel that’s a huge slap in the face,” added DiLorenzo, who blasted her colleagues as “very corrupt” for keeping the negotiations back-room.