‘Dancing With The Stars Juniors’: Sarah Palin’s Grandson Tripp Palin Makes Mistake-Free TV Debut

Tripp Palin, the son of new Teen Mom star Bristol Palin and grandson of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, made his dancing debut on ABC‘s Dancing With The Stars: Juniors.

The 9-year-old is paired with junior pro dancer Hailey Bills with mentor, Jenna Johnson. They were the second team to perform, dancing a Foxtrot to The Shirelles’ classic “Mama Said.”

During the pre-dance video, Tripp introduced Jenna and Hailey to his mother and grandmother, who were out fishing together when the experienced dancers showed up. Once they got into the dancing rehearsal space, Tripp was a bit nervous. However, he later loosened up and embraced dancing.

The judges all praised Tripp for shaking off some of his nerves, but they still took off some points for his technique. Choreographer Mandy Moore gave him a 5, while DWTS pro Val Chmerkovskiy and ice skater Adam Rippon both gave him 6’s, to a total of 17/30.

Although Tripp is not a dancer himself, he does have a dancer in his family. His mother Bristol competed in seasons 11 and 15 of Dancing With The Stars. She finished in third place in season 11 and only made it to week four in her second DWTS round.

Bristol and Sarah were both in the crowd to see Tripp’s dancing debut. As Us Weekly points out, Bristol also took Tripp’s sisters Sailor and Atlee Mayer to Tripp’s dancing rehearsals to support him.

“Bristol was telling him a lot to smile and do ‘oohs and aahs’ with his performance and he did it,” Johnson said of Tripp during the rehearsals. “I think for being a non-dancer, he was able to retain [the steps] really well. But yeah, it’s hard for someone who has never danced before. This is a very daunting place. It’s covered in lights and cameras and costumes, so he did really well.”

Their performance earned few rounds of applause from the audience and good reviews from fans at home.

“Love how hard Tripp was working! So proud of him,” one fan wrote.

Tripp melted some fan’s hearts when he blushed next to Bills.

Another fan thought he did a great job despite his lack of experience.

New episodes of Dancing With The Stars: Juniors air on ABC Sundays at 8 p.m. ET.

Photo credit: ABC