US President Donald Trump has paid tribute to Hollywood legend Chuck Norris who suddenly passed away at the age of 86.
Speaking to the media Trump said on Friday, “Chuck Norris died. I didn’t know that. He was a great guy. He was a really good tough cookie. You didn’t want to fight him. I can tell you, he was a tough great guy. He was a great supporter. Wow. That’s too bad.”
Meanwhile, a video showing Trump holding a football and a helmet has been widely circulated with the claim that it features the moment he learned about the actor’s death.
The video is actually a White House clip of Trump receiving the Commander-in-Chief Trophy, football, and helmet from the Navy team after beating Army.
The former martial arts champion and 1980s action-film hero who fought the bad guys in “Code of Silence,” “Missing in Action” and “The Delta Force” and upheld the law in the TV series “Walker, Texas Ranger,” died on Thursday, his family said in a statement on his Instagram account on Friday.
“While we would like to keep the circumstances private, please know that he was surrounded by his family and was at peace,” the statement read.
The six-time undefeated World Professional Middleweight Karate Champion, whose tough-guy image inspired satirical “facts” that made him an Internet phenomenon, had been hospitalized in Hawaii on Thursday, Variety reported.
Norris starred in more than two dozen films portraying silent loners, soldiers, lawmen, veterans and All-American heroes who captured criminals, released prisoners of war, rescued hostages and battled terrorists.
With his roundhouse kicks he fought martial arts icon Bruce Lee in Rome’s Colosseum in his 1973 film debut “The Way of the Dragon.” Along with actor Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis he helped defeat villain Jean-Claude Van Damme in the 2012 blockbuster “The Expendables 2.”
