WHITE HOUSE
Trump loses 2 pivotal allies in his anti-kneeling
crusade: NASCAR and the NFL
Both are vowing to stand up for racial justice in a
way that could challenge the president’s relationship with each organization.
President Donald Trump has relished NASCAR’s
historically conservative fan base, praising it for being “patriotic Americans”
and serving as the grand marshal of the Daytona 500 earlier this year. |
By MERIDITH
MCGRAW
06/14/2020
07:00 AM EDT
President
Donald Trump has long had two cherished American institutions standing beside
him as he railed against athletes taking a knee during the national anthem:
NASCAR and the NFL.
This week,
they both started to walk away.
Bending to
the cultural moment, NASCAR and the NFL in recent days reversed course on their
approach to athletes protesting racial injustice. NFL Commissioner Roger
Goodell said he had been wrong for not listening to protesting players earlier
and encouraged “all to speak out and peacefully protest.” Meanwhile, NASCAR
relaxed rules barring kneeling during the national anthem and banned
Confederate flags from its events. Within days, a NASCAR driver was circling a
track in a race car emblazoned with #BlackLivesMatter and a NASCAR official was
taking a knee during prerace ceremonies.
The moves
came in response to the protests that have erupted across the country in
response to the killing of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man who died at
the hands of the Minneapolis police. And they reflected shifting cultural
attitudes — polls show an increasing percentage of the population view racism
as a big problem in the country and the protests as a justified response.
Yet Trump
stood his ground. He attacked Goodell, wondering whether the commissioner was
telling players “that it would now be O.K. for the players to KNEEL, or not to
stand, for the national anthem, thereby disrespecting our Country & our
Flag?” And he separately lashed out about a blossoming discussion about
renaming military bases named after Confederate leaders.
The
changing tenor from the two leagues could be pivotal for Trump, though. The
president has long leaned on the front offices of each organization as he has
publicly attacked athletes who took a knee during the national anthem, and
privately pressured some team owners to change anthem rules. Trump has also
relished NASCAR’s historically conservative, Southern fan base, praising it for
being “patriotic Americans” and serving as the grand marshal of the Daytona 500
earlier this year. At rallies, he has praised racing fans for standing during
the national anthem, and cursed at NFL players taking a knee.
“The shift
is really going to put a damper on one of his favorite playbooks,” said LZ
Granderson, a sports and culture columnist for the Los Angeles Times who has
been covering the NFL and NASCAR reactions to the Floyd protests. “People who
didn’t give a damn before won’t give a damn now, but the people who view
themselves as nonracist, they just aren’t going for that rhetoric anymore.”
The debate
over kneeling during the national anthem began in 2016, when San Francisco
49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the song in protest of
police brutality and racial injustice. Trump fanned the flames of the issue, at
one point calling for NFL owners to fire players for taking a knee.
“Get that
son of a bitch off the field,” he said during a 2017 rally in Alabama.
Around the
same time, Trump praised NASCAR for resisting kneeling protests.
“So proud
of NASCAR and its supporters and fans,” Trump wrote in a tweet in September
2017. “They won’t put up with disrespecting our Country or our Flag — they said
it loud and clear!”
The next
year, the NFL banned players from kneeling on the field during the anthem,
leading many players to simply stay near the locker room during the song. The
decision put them in line with NASCAR.
Trump
praised the decision, suggesting kneeling players “maybe shouldn’t be in the
country” and taking credit for bringing attention to the issue before “the
people pushed it forward.”
It was just
one of several examples of how the president has used the NFL and NASCAR
stances on protests to his political advantage, from taking a lap around the
storied Daytona racetrack in his presidential limousine to using the NFL protests
to rev up his fans at rallies. And the leagues’ refusal to allow overt kneeling
gave Trump two allies as he fanned the culture war flames over the issue.
More
broadly, the president has long aligned himself with the two leagues. Trump
once tried to purchase an NFL team and counts some NFL owners, including New
England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, among his supporters and donors. Trump
tapped New York Jets part-owner Woody Johnson as the U.S. ambassador to the
United Kingdom. And he has praised the NASCAR-founding France family, some of
whom are Trump donors, at political events.
But now, in
the wake of a national movement, both organizations are promising to stand up
for racial justice in a way that could challenge the president’s relationship
with them. Instead of allies, the leagues may become yet another Trump attack
target.
Goodell
this week said he, and the league, were wrong. The NFL, he said, “believes
black lives matter.”
NASCAR
President Steve Phelps said the sport must “do better” addressing racial
injustice.
As part of
that, NASCAR issued a statement banning the Confederate flag from all events,
just hours before Bubba Wallace, NASCAR’s only top-tier black driver, made laps
in a race car painted with “Black Lives Matter.”
“The
presence of the Confederate flag at NASCAR events runs contrary to our
commitment to providing a welcoming and inclusive environment for all fans, our
competitors and our industry,” the association said in a statement.
Former
NASCAR CEO Brian France, who made a push to get rid of the flag in 2015, told
POLITICO the organization “can’t be out of step and need to meet the moment.”
“In all
sports, we have this big platform and we are speaking to millions of people
every week, and have a devoted fan base and we need to lead,” France said.
The
announcements come as Trump has gone the opposite way. He shut the door on a
push to rename military bases named after Confederate leaders, tweeting that
the names are part of a “Great American Heritage.” And he went after both
Goodell and New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, who also recently
apologized for saying that kneeling disrespects the flag.
“We can no
longer use the flag to turn people away or distract them from the real issues
that face our black communities,” Brees said.
Trump
pounced on the apology, tweeting that Brees “should not have taken back his
original stance on honoring our magnificent American Flag.”
The
president’s obstinance in the midst of a racially heated moment has been
compared with his response to the 2017 protests in Charlottesville, Va., when
Trump equated white nationalists with those protesting the removal of
Confederate statues.
This time
around, some of the president’s advisers have urged him to take a less
combative tone. Instead, he has leaned into “law-and-order” rhetoric and stuck
by most of his previous stances. Trump has not, however, commented on NASCAR’s
ban of Confederate flags.
An
administration official referred to Trump’s 2015 comments about the removal of
the Confederate flag from the South Carolina statehouse. “I would take it down,
yes,” Trump said when asked about then-Gov. Nikki Haley’s decision. “I think
they should put it in a museum and respect whatever it is you have to respect.”
Trump and
first lady Melania Trump ride in the presidential limousine as they take a pace
lap ahead of the start of NASCAR's Daytona 500. | Saul Loeb/Pool Photo via AP
Andrew
Giuliani, a special assistant to the president who’s worked as a White House
liaison to sports programs, said “there’s been no president since [Abraham]
Lincoln who’s done more for the black and Hispanic communities in the United
States than President Trump. At the same time, he has been consistent in his
belief that we should stand proud for our great American flag and asks American
citizens to kneel only for God.”
The NFL is
“taking an issue that most people agree with — peacefully protesting racial
disparities and racial injustice — and then they’re reembracing a type of that
protest or debate [kneeling] … that a lot of people that don’t think people
should do,” said another administration official.
But the
issue remains divisive. A recent Yahoo News/YouGov poll found that 52 percent
of Americans think it is OK for NFL players to kneel during the national anthem
to protest police killings of African Americans.
Meanwhile,
44 percent of NASCAR fans said race attendees should be allowed to express
themselves however they want, including by displaying the Confederate flag,
according to a Morning Consult poll.
The
president, according to an official, is expected to continue to stump against
kneeling during the anthem, believing it works to his political advantage.
“Kneeling
during the national anthem is a slap in the face to the men and women of the
United States military who defend our freedoms, many of whom make the ultimate
sacrifice,” Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said.
Still, the
question remains whether more than Trump’s die-hard supporters will stick with
him.
“He
completely missed the boat,” said Rick Reilly, a former Sports Illustrated and
ESPN contributor and the author of “Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains
Trump.”
“It’s like
somehow his cable that comes into the White House is set in 1962, he’s so far
behind,” Reilly added. “This is a watershed moment and he’s lost. It’s like
your grandpa who thinks Joe DiMaggio is still playing.”
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