Saints QB Drew Brees issued a powerful statement to Donald Trump about why he now supports taking a knee during NFL games, after Trump dissed him for changing his opinion.
NFL players taking a knee during the National Anthem and raising of the American flag has never got as much attention — and shifts in opinion — as it has in the past 48 hours. It started out when New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees in a June 3 interview said, “I will never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag of the United States of America” by kneeling. Then he had a had a complete change of heart. After an initial apology for his statement, Drew explained how he now realizes that taking a knee was never about the flag, but about racial injustice and peaceful protesting. He made a powerful statement in a clap back towards President Donald Trump, who had cheered on his initial anti-kneeling stance and was upset when Drew changed his mind. It happened to come on the same day that NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell finally acknowledged that after four years, “We, the NFL, admit we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest,” including taking a knee.
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Drew, 41, had already apologized, but decided to share share a lengthy Instagram post late on June 5 where he directly addressed the president. “To @realdonaldtrump. Through my ongoing conversations with friends, teammates, and leaders in the black community, I realize this is not an issue about the American flag. It has never been. We can no longer use the flag to turn people away or distract them from the real issues that face our black communities,” he began.
“We did this back in 2017, and regretfully I brought it back with my comments this week. We must stop talking about the flag and shift our attention to the real issues of systemic racial injustice, economic oppression, police brutality, and judicial & prison reform. We are at a critical juncture in our nation’s history! If not now, then when?” he asked.
Drew then told Trump, “We as a white community need to listen and learn from the pain and suffering of our black communities. We must acknowledge the problems, identify the solutions, and then put this into action. The black community cannot do it alone. This will require all of us.”
While Trump isn’t budging on his stance about kneeling during the National Anthem, the NFL has finally got on the right side of history. The league seems to have seen the light after a number of it’s top black players put together a video narrating how they too could be George Floyd. He’s the 46-year-old who died on May 25 after a Minneapolis Police officer kneeled on the handcuffed man’s neck for nearly nine minutes, as he pleaded that he couldn’t breathe. His horrifying death sparked hundreds of protests nationwide in support of Black Lives Matter and calling out police brutality against African-Americans.
A group of young, elite black NFL stars taped a video released on June 4 via their respective social media pages asking, “What if I was George Floyd?” The likes of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, 24, who is the reigning Super Bowl Champ and game MVP; Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson, 24, Dallas Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott, 24, Arizona Cardinals wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins, 28, and New York Giants running back Saquon Barkley, 23, all participated in the video.
New Orleans Saints wide receiver Michael Thomas — who had called out his teammate Drew’s initial no-kneeling stance as him not knowing better — started off the video by saying, “It’s been 10 days since George Floyd was brutally murdered.” Then others appeared and asked, “How many times do we need to ask you to listen to your players? What will it take? For one of us to be murdered by police brutality?” DeAndre then said to the camera, “I am George Floyd,” as other players named unarmed black victims killed by police, including “I am Breonna Taylor,” and “I am Eric Garner.”
The message seemed to work, as the NFL announced they would now “listen to” their players as they had asked. Goodell released a video late in the afternoon on June 5, stating “We, the NFL, condemn racism and the systematic oppression of Black People. We, the NFL, admit we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest. We, the NFL, believe Black Lives Matter.”
However, Goodell failed to apologize to Colin Kaepernick, the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback who started the kneeling protests four years ago in the 2016 season and has since been without a team. Colin settled a lawsuit against the NFL in 2019 for colluding to keep him out of the league. Colin’s lawyers argued he had been blacklisted for his taking a knee against police brutality and injustice during the National Anthem, which had generated so much controversy. Hopefully now that the NFL is finally okay with taking a knee in peaceful protests, Colin will get a chance to play in the NFL again.