President Donald Trump said Thursday that he would award himself the Medal of Honor if the rules let him, making the remark in front of decorated veterans at the National Medal of Honor Museum in Arlington, Texas.

"I want for myself a Congressional Medal of Honor, and I've studied it and I would give it to myself. I have no problem. But I'm not allowed to," Trump said during his September 10 visit.

"Can you believe it? The one thing I'm not allowed to do, I would give it to myself," he continued.

Trump then predicted that news outlets would jump on the comment and said, "I'm only kidding." A few seconds later he added, "Actually, I'm not kidding," and the crowd laughed.

This was Trump's first visit to the museum since it opened in March 2025. The White House said the trip was meant to honor military heroism and give the president a chance to meet Medal of Honor recipients face to face.

Ahead of the visit, White House spokesperson Liz Huston said Trump would meet recipients and "honor the extraordinary courage and distinguished service of these American heroes."

The Medal of Honor is the highest US military decoration for valor in combat. By law, it goes only to service members who show extraordinary courage while risking their lives in battle.

Recommendations pass through a long military review before they ever reach the president, who then presents the medal in the name of Congress. So the president can hand the medal to someone else. He cannot simply claim one for himself.

Trump never served in the armed forces. During the Vietnam era he received student deferments, then a medical deferment after doctors diagnosed him with bone spurs in his heels.

That diagnosis drew fresh scrutiny in 2018. The daughters of Queens podiatrist Dr. Larry Braunstein told The New York Times their father had said the diagnosis was a favor to Trump's father, Fred Trump, who owned the building where Braunstein rented his office.

"What he got was access to Fred Trump," Braunstein's daughter, Dr. Elysa Braunstein, said. "If there was anything wrong in the building, my dad would call and Trump would take care of it immediately. That was the small favor that he got."

Dr. Braunstein died in 2007, so he never got the chance to confirm or deny the story himself.

Thursday's remark was not the first time Trump has talked about an honor he technically cannot claim. Presidents usually present awards like the Medal of Honor. They are not normally the ones waiting to receive them.

Trump has also spent much of his second term arguing that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize, often pointing to his role in ending conflicts abroad.

"I ended eight wars. Did I get the Nobel Prize? No," Trump said from the Oval Office last Friday, before bringing up this year's actual winner. "Although the person that got it was nice enough that she gave it to me. She said, nobody in the history of the Nobel Prize deserves it more than you. But in Norway, they don't like me because I think they think I'm a little conservative."

He was talking about María Corina Machado, the Venezuelan opposition leader who won the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize. Machado presented Trump with the physical medal in January, not long after he helped bring about the capture of Venezuela's former president, Nicolás Maduro.

But the gesture did not change who actually holds the honor. The Norwegian Nobel Institute said the Peace Prize "cannot be revoked, shared or transferred to others," calling the decision final. A medal can change hands. The title of Nobel laureate cannot.

Featured image via YouTube screengrab.