FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Daniel Penny, a military veteran who choked an agitated New York subway rider and was acquitted of homicide this week, has been invited by Vice President-elect JD Vance to join Donald Trump's suite at the Army-Navy football game on Saturday.
The Marine veteran was cleared of criminally negligent homicide in Jordan Neely 's 2023 death. A more serious manslaughter charge was dismissed last week.
Vance said Penny, 26, accepted his invitation to join the president-elect and him at the game.
''Daniel's a good guy, and New York's mob district attorney tried to ruin his life for having a backbone,'' Vance said in a post on X. ''I'm grateful he accepted my invitation and hope he's able to have fun and appreciate how much his fellow citizens admire his courage.''
The case sparked national debate, with some hailing Penny as a hero for attempting to subdue a man he considered a menace to public safety and others seeing him as a white vigilante who choked a Black man to death.
Political figures on the right have defended Penny since he was charged for the death in May 2023. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who ran for the GOP presidential nomination and was tapped by Trump last month to lead an effort along with billionaire Elon Musk to cut government spending, donated money to his legal defense fund.
After the acquittal, Penny gave an extensive interview to Fox News and declared he's ''not a confrontational person.'' He told the network that he wouldn't have been able to live with ''the guilt I would have felt if someone did get hurt, if he did do what he was threatening to do.''
''I'll take a million court appearances and people calling me names and people hating me, just to keep one of those people from getting hurt or killed,'' Penny said.
