White House athlete visits mix stars and gripes
“If the president wants to see me, he knows where to find me.”
They’re words uttered by a pro athlete who won a championship but declined a customary invitation to to meet the commander-in-chief.
The athlete was Larry Bird, basketball legend. Thirty-three years ago, he snubbed Republican President Ronald Reagan. He never said why.
This year, the tradition of championship-winning teams visiting the White House took a sharp political turn with the NBA champion Golden State Warriors taking a pass on their invitation, citing words and deeds by President Donald Trump. More than 30 members of the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots gave similar reasons when they declined to join their teammates visiting Trump.
The adage that sports and politics don’t mix seemed to vanish this year, with so many athletes and teams speaking out and protesting perceived injustices.
Politics has become much more polarized, “and so a visit to the White House which used to be benign is now politically significant,” says Simon Darnell, assistant professor at the University of Toronto’s faculty of kinesiology and physical education.
Athletes are drawing more attention to the topics of racism and inequality and acknowledging they’re affected by these issues, Darnell says. He pointed to NFLers kneeling during the U.S. national anthem, a gesture sparked by quarterback Colin Kaepernick.
As a result, it now seems athletes can’t make decisions about matters such as whether to accept White House invitations without having to explain themselves to the public, Darnell adds.
Kaepernick began kneeling during the anthem in late 2016, to protest racial injustice and oppression facing African Americans. Other NFL players followed suit to support his cause, even after he was out of the league.
Amateur teams began going to the White House as far back as the mid-1860s, while the first championship winning pro baseball team attended in 1925. That was the Washington Senators, winners of the previous year’s World Series. They were hosted by then-president Calvin Coolidge.
Teams that later followed include the Super Bowl-winning Pittsburgh Steelers. The squad was on hand for the same ceremony in 1980 with then-president Jimmy Carter as baseball’s Pittsburgh Pirates. In June 1991, the Penguins were the first NHL team to visit after capturing a title, meeting George H.W. Bush.
Bird’s decision to skip the visit in 1984 — usually consisting of handshakes and photo ops — is said to be the first snub of significance, even though he didn’t give political reasons.
But one of the first athletes to explicitly give such a rationale for a Washington boycott was a golfer. American Tom Lehman was a member of the 1993 Ryder Cup-winning team, invited to meet then-president Bill Clinton. He declined, citing Clinton’s pro-choice views and his draft avoidance. (Clinton had done so lawfully through a deferment in the late 1960s.)
When Barack Obama was elected in 2008, things became heated again.
The Boston Bruins visited in 2012, but goalie Tim Thomas declined, saying “I believe the (U.S.) government has grown out of control, threatening the rights, liberties and property of the people.” He insisted his decision was “not about politics,” saying both the Democrats and Re- publicans were “responsible for the situation we are in as a country.”
The following year, the NFL’s 1972 Miami Dolphins, the only team in league history with an undefeated season, were feted by Obama. Three former players skipped the White House, voicing strong political views doing so. One of the three, Bob Kuechenberg, was quoted as saying “I just don’t believe in this administration, at all.” Then came Trump. In April, 30-plus members of the New England Patriots cited various issues, including worries about not feeling welcome at the White House, and “prejudiced” remarks by Trump. (Several other Patriots players, their coach and the owner did attend, but superstar Tom Brady, who is friendly with Trump, opted out of the visit citing family commitments — similar to the reasons he gave for skipping his team’s 2015 appearance, when Obama was president.)
This past September, Steph Curry of the Golden State Warriors explained he didn’t want to go to the White House in part because the team can’t abide what Trump has said, and what the president “hasn’t said at the right times.”
That was believed aimed at Trump’s blame for “many sides” after the riots in Charlottesville, Va., in mid-August, where white supremacists clashed with antiracism protesters.
Less than a day after Curry’s remarks, Trump tweeted that the invitation to the Warriors was “withdrawn.”
In a tweet that went viral, NBA star LeBron James called Trump a “bum” over the incident and said visiting Pennsylvania Ave. was “a great honour” until Trump was elected.
In late November, Golden State coach Steve Kerr spoke out about the idea of
“I just don’t believe in this administration, at all.” BOB KUECHENBERG A FORMER MIAMI DOLPHIN, ON DECLINING TO MEET BARACK OBAMA
visiting Trump.
Kerr won several championships as an NBA player and head coach and visited the White House during the presidencies of Reagan, both Bushes, Clinton and Obama.
But he said the idea of attending didn’t “feel right” for him and his players. Kerr went on to add that given Trump’s words and actions toward others — including calling NFL players who kneel during the anthem “sons of bitches” — it was a “human respect issue” that prompted the Warriors to skip the visit.
It’s noteworthy that in Canada there is no established tradition of championship-winning teams or athletes visiting prime ministers, though they have often called athletes or more recently congratulated them on social media.
But while the Warriors opted out, Canadian Sidney Crosby, captain of the Penguins, called the White House invitation an “honour.”
The team, consisting almost entirely of white players except Trevor Daley, who couldn’t attend due to scheduling problems, went to see Trump in October. He called the team members “patriots.” Observers noted that most of the players were Canadian or European.
Perhaps sports fans should just get used to watching athletes in a different arena. Darnell of U of T doesn’t think the practice of snubbing the White House or other political statements by pro athletes will vanish anytime soon.