Trump Signs Proclamation Restoring Presidential Fitness Test Award

President Dwight D. Eisenhower established the President’s Council on Youth Fitness by executive order in 1956.

President Donald Trump speaks to athletes, as U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (R) looks on during a proclamation signing in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on May 5, 2026. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

President Donald Trump signed a presidential memorandum on May 5 restoring the Presidential Fitness Test Award, a decades-long competitive school fitness program that was ended during the Obama administration.

In July 2025, Trump signed an executive order that reestablished the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness, and Nutrition, as well as the Presidential Fitness Test. Tuesday’s memorandum goes one step further by restoring the test and awards at all U.S. schools.