Acting Attorney General and former hot tub salesman Matthew Whitaker claimed he earned “All-American” academic honors during his University of Iowa football days on his resume and on government applications, but there’s no record of it being true, the Wall Street Journal found.
Whitaker claimed to have achieved the status of “Academic All-American” while he was a tight end at the University of Iowa in the early 1990s. The College Sports Information Directors of America told the Journal it had no record of bestowing the honor, which requires a 3.3 GPA, on Whitaker.
Whitaker claimed to have been awarded the honor in a 2010 application for an Iowa judgeship and in a resume sent to the patent marketing firm that he twisted arms for. The FTC shut down that firm this year, calling it a “scam.”
A Justice Department spokeswoman told WSJ that Whitaker had relied on a 1993 media guide for University of Iowa football, which caused him to make the error. Whitaker’s last year playing college football was 1992.
