During his Super Bowl Sunday CBS interview with Face the Nation moderator Margaret Brennan, President Donald Trump demonstrated how he'd favorably addressed some major issues raised by the NFL's social justice warriors. Yet the Super Bowl had barely ended when media began looking for Patriots' players willing to snub the president by skipping the team's likely White House reception.
Aside from NFL players' anthem protests, one of their biggest issues has been criminal justice reform. That was especially true of the NFL Players' Coalition, a group of current and retired pro football players who shook down the league for $89 million to pursue a social justice wish list. Trump signed such reform into law, and he told Brennan:
“I’m the one that had passed judicial reform. And if you look at what I did, criminal judicial reform, and what I’ve done – President Obama tried. They all tried. Everybody wanted to do it. And I got it done and I’ve been, you know, really – a lot of people in the NFL have been calling and thanking me for it.”
In 2017, President Trump spoke with insensitivity to the issue of brain damage suffered by football players. On Sunday, Trump expressed concern about that issue and said he would not want his son Barron risking such injuries by playing football:
"If he wanted to? Yes. Would I steer him that way? No, I wouldn't. I just don't like the reports that I see coming out having to do with football. I mean, it’s a dangerous sport and I think it’s … really tough. I thought the equipment would get better, and it has. The helmets have gotten far better but it hasn’t solved the problem.
“So, you know, I hate to say it because I love to watch football. I think the NFL is a great product, but I really think that as far as my son, well, I’ve heard NFL players saying they wouldn’t let their sons play football.”
Also in 2017, Trump angrily thundered that NFL teams should fire anyone who kneeled for the playing of the national anthem: "Get that son of a bitch off the field right now!" On Sunday, he sounded more accepting of protest while still calling for respectful behavior:
“I think that people have to, at all times, respect our flag and at all times respect our National Anthem and our country. And I think there are plenty of places and times you can protest and you can do a lot. But you can’t do that. That’s my opinion.”
All this being said, Trump took a beating in the press for his interview. Sports media lent plenty of space to a New England player who quickly announced he will not accompany the team to any White House celebration and to athletes and teams who've snubbed Trump in recent years. New England safety Duron Harmon told Sports Illustrated, "I probably won’t go. I'm not going. I did not go last time. We all know why. I just feel like, for what he believes and what he says, it doesn’t sit well with me, so there’s no point in going there. It would be fake to shake his hand.”
Harmon told TMZ Sports: ""Nah, man. They don’t want me in the White House. It would be dope (to celebrate with Obama, as the NBA defending champion Warriors recently did). Obama, come holler at me, man. We love you over here, man."
Writers like USA Today's Scott Gleeson delivered well-worn recitations of past teams (dominated by social justice warriors) like the Golden State Warriors, who "have been vocal about their distaste for Trump and have not attended the White House after winning the title in each of the last two years. ..."
ABC's Deena Zaru strolled well down this anti-Trump road, too. "One day after the (Patriots' 2017 Super Bowl) win, tight end Martellus Bennett told reporters that he would not participate in the traditional White House visit, where the Super Bowl LI champs were set to be honored by Trump."
"And after that," Zaru continued, "several other players including defensive end Chris Long, running back LeGarrette Blount, defensive tackle Alan Branch and linebacker Dont'a Hightower announced that they would also not attend, with some citing their opposition to Trump."
She also recounted how only a handful of the 2018 champion Eagles were going to the White House and Trump rescinded the invitation.
Despite all this New England opposition to the president, Zaru's "bi-polar story" also insisted that the Patriots are "Team Trump." Because owner Robert Kraft and Coach Bill Belichick are friends with the president, as is quarterback Tom Brady, seen with a Make America Great Again hat in his locker four years ago. She isn't the only reporter making that claim either. Ironically, Brady skipped that 2017 visit by the Patriots to Trump's White House, citing a family commitment, and he later called Trump's remarks about firing protesting SOBs "divisive."
