Politics - News Analysis

Nasty Trump Says He Hopes NFL Stays Closed if Players Continue to Kneel: ‘I Hope They Don’t Open!’

Donald Trump called into Clay Travis’s Fox Sports radio show on Tuesday morning to talk about the impact of COVID-19 on sports, but he couldn’t resist hitting on his favorite topic: athletes protesting by kneeling during the national anthem.

He addressed the situation with the pro sports leagues attempting to start up, primarily the NBA, MLB, and the NFL. Trump said that every athlete had better stand for the national anthem and the flag, though he didn’t issue any sort of ultimatum about what he might do if they don’t. He did not acknowledge the cause that is leading the athletes to eschew standing for the national anthem. Once again, it simply never occurs to Trump that if the nation’s leadership did something that made everyone proud to be an American, no one would be kneeling.

Apparently, Trump just wants to stamp out free speech and activism:

“Well, they wanna open and they wanna open badly. They’ve been working with government. I would say this, if they don’t stand for the national anthem I hope they don’t open. But other than that I would love to see them open and we’re doing everything possible for them getting them open. I think they can protest in other ways. They shouldn’t protest our flag or our country,”

What are they supposed to protest, if not the country? And if not the flag, what? The point of protests is to get people talking, and Trump refuses to discuss the underlying issue.

Trump then seems to revel in the majority African-American NBA struggling with ratings (We don’t know whether the ratings are down or not):

“I think it’s been horrible for basketball. Look at the basketball ratings. They’re down to very low numbers. People are angry about it. They don’t realize. … They have enough politics with guys like me. They don’t need more as they’re driving down … going up for the shot. They don’t need it. There’s a nastiness about the NBA about the way it was done too. So I think the NBA is in trouble. It’s in big trouble. Bigger trouble than they understand,”

Over half the NBA is African-American, and the NBA is the league that Trump calls “nasty,” perhaps because many NBA players have called him out for his racist actions.

“I did not like what baseball did even a little bit. Again, you have to stand for your flag and you have to stand for your flag and your country. They’re making millions of dollars a year to play a sport you’d be playing anyway if you didn’t make … they’d be playing it on the weekends. They have to respect their country.

“If they don’t, frankly, if the NFL didn’t open I’d be very happy. If they don’t stand for the flag and stand strongly I’d be happier if they didn’t open. Without that and with that being said, I’d love to see them open.”

All Trump does is divide and he’s always on the side of the racists. He seems to say: “Unless they get behind me, I would be happier if they don’t open. The choice is to support me or don’t open,” which fits Trump’s view of the world. People are either good or bad depending on if they support him, and that is the end of his analysis.

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Peace, y’all
Jason
[email protected] and on Twitter @MiciakZoom

meet the author

Jason Miciak is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is originally from Canada but grew up in the Pacific Northwest. He now enjoys life as a single dad raising a ridiculously-loved young girl on the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He is very much the dreamy mystic, a day without learning is a day not lived. He is passionate about his flower pots and studies philosophical science, religion, and non-mathematical principles of theoretical physics. Dogs, pizza, and love are proof that God exists. "Above all else, love one another."

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