Ryder Cup officials will give away 3,000 tickets to unsuspecting golf fans

Thousands of golf fans in the New York area could be in for a big surprise over the next five months: The PGA of America is giving away free tickets to the Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black.

In a giveaway being called, “The People's Perk,” the PGA of America will be giving away tickets randomly to New York residents — no notice when or where — who are at Bethpage Black and several other public golf courses on Long Island and the New York City metro area.

The Metropolitan PGA Section will help choose the public courses, and the PGA of America then will conduct randomly selected visits to distribute the tickets. There also will be a series of special visits to give Ryder Cup tickets to area first responders and community groups.

In both cases, the giveaways will feature PGA of America leaders and special Ryder Cup guests.

The Ryder Cup is Sept. 28-30 on the notorious Black course at Bethpage State Park, which has hosted two U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship. The first U.S. Open at a true public course was at Bethpage Black in 2002 and was referred to as “The People's Open.”

The Ryder Cup is one of the toughest tickets in golf next to the Masters. The ticket price for competition days (which includes food and nonalcoholic drinks) was $750 for the 2025 matches, more than double what it was at Whistling Straits in 2021, the last time the Ryder Cup was held in the United States.

More than 500,000 people registered to buy tickets. They went on sale Nov. 13 and tickets for match days (Friday through Sunday) sold out in a matter of hours.

The random giveaway is 500 tickets a day from Tuesday through Sunday. Each person chosen will get vouchers for two tickets.

Anyone getting a free ticket on the Tuesday-Thursday practice days can use the junior admission policy in which kids 15 or under get in for free with a ticketed adult.

Don Rea Jr., the president of the PGA of America, said “The People's Perk” is a “special way for us to celebrate the unparalleled dedication and enthusiasm of the New York golf community by providing them with a memorable experience at the 2025 Ryder Cup.

“The PGA of America is proud to share the excitement of golf’s greatest team event with our host community,” Rea said. "We cannot wait to welcome the lucky ticket recipients this September as we all rally behind Captain Keegan Bradley and the United States team.”

The Europeans won two years ago at Marco Simone in Italy, and they have won eight of the last 11 times in the Ryder Cup. Their last win on U.S. soil was in 2012 at Medinah.

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FILE - Fans cheer on the first tee during a singles match the Ryder Cup golf matches at the Whistling Straits Golf Course, Sunday, Sept. 26, 2021, in Sheboygan, Wis. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis, File)

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — A former Polish justice minister who faces prosecution in his homeland over alleged abuse of power said Monday that he has been granted asylum in Hungary.

Zbigniew Ziobro was a key figure in the government led by the nationalist conservative Law and Justice party that ran Poland between 2015 and 2023. That administration established political control over key judicial institutions by stacking higher courts with friendly judges and punishing its critics with disciplinary action or assignments to far-away locations.

Current Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government came to power more than two years ago with ambitions to roll back the changes, but efforts to undo them have been blocked by two successive presidents aligned with the national right.

In October, prosecutors requested the lifting of Ziobro's parliamentary immunity to press charges against him. They allege among other things that Ziobro misused a fund for victims of violence, including for the purchase of Israeli Pegasus surveillance software.

Tusk’s party says Law and Justice used Pegasus to spy illegally on political opponents while in power. Ziobro says he acted lawfully.

Hungary, led by nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, has hosted several politicians close to Law and Justice while Polish authorities were seeking them.

In a lengthy post on X Monday, Ziobro wrote that he had “decided to accept the asylum granted to me by the government of Hungary due to the political persecution in Poland.”

“I have decided to remain abroad until genuine guarantees of the rule of law are restored in Poland,” he said. “I believe that instead of acquiescing to being silenced and subjected to a torrent of lies — which I would have no opportunity to refute — I can do more by fighting the mounting lawlessness in Poland.”

Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said in Budapest on Monday that Hungarian authorities have granted asylum to “several” individuals who would face political persecution in Poland, according to his ministry. He declined to specify their names.

In an English-language post on X, Tusk wrote that “the former Minister of Justice(!), Mr. Ziobro, who was the mastermind of the political corruption system, has asked the government of Victor Orbán for political asylum.”

“A logical choice,” he added.

FILE - The leader of the Polish junior coalition partners Zbigniew Ziobro, speaks to reporters alongside in Warsaw, Poland, Saturday, Sept. 26, 2020. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski, file)