September 9, 2018

Trump Renews Attacks on Kneeling Players as NFL Opts Not to Punish Them

“If the players stood proudly for our Flag and Anthem, maybe ratings would come back?”

Former San Francisco 49ers safety Eric Reid and quarterback Colin Kaepernick kneel during the national anthem in September 2016. Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

As the 2018 football season kicks off, the NFL has opted not to punish players who kneel during the national anthem. But that’s not stopping President Donald Trump from attacking players who don’t stand during the anthem.

On Sunday, Trump lobbed his latest Twitter tirade, writing, “If the players stood proudly for our Flag and Anthem, and it is all shown on broadcast, maybe ratings would come back?”

The league’s first full day of games begins amid news that the league will not punish players who kneel during the anthem. According to ESPN, negotiations on the issue have stalled, and so the league has decided the best policy is no policy for the time being. 

Back in May, the NFL’s owners announced a policy requiring all players and league personnel on the sideline to stand for the national anthem, but the policy gave them the option to stay in the locker room if they chose not to stand. That announcement caused the NFL Players Association to file a grievance against the league, arguing that the policy was decided without consultation from the players’ union and violated players’ rights to free speech.

Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick began kneeling during the national anthem in 2016 as a way to protest the killing of unarmed black people by police in America. Kaepernick, once one of the NFL’s most electrifying stars, opted out of his contract with the rebuilding 49ers after that season ended and has been a free agent ever since.

Last October, Kaepernick filed a grievance against the NFL, arguing that team owners have conspired to keep him out of the league because of his silent protest and outspoken activism. Just before this season kicked off, Nike, the NFL’s official sponsor and a longtime marketer of rebellion against authority, announced that Kaepernick is the new face of its 30th-anniversary Just Do It ad campaign with the tag line “Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything.” 

Sales jumped 31 percent. Rebellion, it seems, is good for business.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate