With his New England Patriots headed to face the Atlanta Falcons in Sunday's Super Bowl, team owner Bob Kraft had nothing but nice things to say about President Donald Trump — like him, a part-time Palm Beacher — in a new interview with the New York Daily News.
The two men, Kraft said, forged a stronger friendship when Kraft's philanthropist wife of nearly 50 years, Myra, died of cancer in 2011 at 68. Her death devastated Kraft, and Trump and his wife, Melania, who is today first lady, expressed a continuing concern for him and his family.
“When Myra died, Melania and Donald came up to the funeral in our synagogue, then they came for memorial week to visit with me,” Kraft told writer Gary Myers. “Then he called me once a week for the whole year, the most depressing year of my life when I was down and out. He called me every week to see how I was doing, invited me to things, tried to lift my spirits. He was one of five or six people that were like that. I remember that.”
Longtime Democrat
Kraft was a guest at a pre-inauguration dinner with Trump and the strength of their friendship puzzled many observers, since Kraft is a longtime Democrat, Myers wrote in his story published Jan. 29 at NYDailyNews.com.
The two men, however, share other connections, including the fact that both have spent plenty of time during the winter on the island, with Trump traveling here on his private jet from New York City, just as Kraft and his wife did on theirs. The Krafts divided their time between homes in Brookline, Mass., Cape Cod and Palm Beach, and Kraft today resides in a double apartment on oceanfront Breakers Row during trips to the island.
The two men's friendship predates Myra Kraft's death, and Kraft attended the Trumps' Palm Beach wedding in 2009 at The Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea. Trump, in fact, met the Krafts 20 years ago, according to a 2013 story in The Boston Globe, which mentioned that the two men had carried out "philanthropic work together in Palm Beach."
"They had an amazing marriage, and Bob was devastated when she died," Trump told the Globe. "He suffered greatly for a year, and he still suffers. But at some point, life has to go on, and it's going on for Bob."
Both men have regularly earned spots on the Palm Beach Daily News'annual list of Forbes-ranked billionaires who have homes in Palm Beach. In the most recent Forbes 400 list of U.S. billionaires released in November, Kraft's fortune of $5.1 billion tied him at 102nd place with three other tycoons, while Trump ended up tied with 17 others in 156th place with a net worth of $3.7 billion.
> PHOTOS: Palm Beach residents on Forbes' billionaires list
> See a list of Palm Beach's highest-taxed estates for 2016
Kraft heads The Kraft Group, a family business with headquarters at One Patriot Place in Foxborough, Mass. The company's interests include manufacturing, sports, entertainment and real estate investment.
Palm Beach social scene
The Krafts were members of the Palm Beach Country Club, where Myra Kraft was an avid golfer. But it’s unclear whether Kraft also is a member at The Mar-a-Lago Club, the private club Trump opened in 1995 in the landmarked 1927 mansion built by cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post.
On the island's social scene, Robert Kraft was said to be among the boldfaced names — including Karl Rove, Sean Hannity and fellow Palm Beacher Rudy Giuliani — who attended the 2010 wedding reception at The Breakers when Palm Beacher Rush Limbaugh married Kathryn Rogers.
Real estate-wise, Kraft was involved in a notable Palm Beach sale in 2010, when a trust affiliated with him sold an oceanfront vacant lot at 947 N. Ocean Blvd. for a recorded $19.32 million. The trust had bought the vacant lot five years prior for $19.13 million. Kraft's trust sold the 1.6-acre lot to a company linked in public records to Philadelphia Phillies co-owner John Middleton, who has built a new house there. The 2010 sale was handled by real estate agent Crista Ryan of Tina Fanjul Associates, who declined to identify or comment on anyone involved in the transaction.
In addition to Kraft and Middleton, Palm Beach is the winter home of a number of other owners of professional sports teams, including Jeffrey Lurie of the Philadelphia Eagles, members of the Rooney family of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Minnesota Vikings co-owner Mark Wilf and Charles Johnson of the San Francisco Giants baseball franchise.
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