Trump and ICE Have Overshadowed Super Bowl Week for the NFL
You know things are bad when American politics has taken the country’s attention away from America’s favorite sporting event.
By Carron J. Phillips
Bad Bunny might go down as the Super Bowl’s most memorable halftime show performer — and he hasn’t even touched the stage yet.
As we approach the kickoff of Super Bowl 60 between the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks, it’s evident that sports — once a source of escape or distraction for many — are now a potential change agent, highlighting that no aspect of our lives is free from the urgent and serious issues at hand.
“But there was the issue of — like, fucking ICE could be outside. And it’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about,” Bad Bunny said last year, as a warning to those who thought they’d never be in the crosshairs. It’s not crazy to assume that some people probably felt some way about Bad Bunny not touring in mainland United States because of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. But then ICE started killing white people.
“They’ve lost the plot,” former ESPN anchor and current CNN Contributor Cari Champion recently explained on the network’s airwaves. “The plot was deportation. The plot was to get rid of violent immigrants who were taking jobs and harming people in this country, etc. The plot wasn’t to kill American citizens,” she said after ICE agents killed Renée Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota.
A decade ago, Colin Kaepernick kneeled during the national anthem because he wanted police to stop using Black bodies as target practice, and America lost its mind. It was the beginning of a run that saw leagues changed; playoff games boycotted; Black senators elected; and a surge of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives — largely because the sports world demanded it. After George Floyd was murdered under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer in May 2020, when many Americans were in lockdown during the early stages of the COVID pandemic, Black Lives Matter protests across the country demonstrated the ongoing need for changes in sports, corporations, and politics.
And America lost its mind again.
Millions of Americans who had been willfully sleeping at the wheel were awakened from their slumber when Don Lemon and Georgia Fort were arrested for being Black first and covering the news second.
A decade ago, Philando Castile’s mother warned America about what’s happening now: “The system continues to fail Black people, and it will continue to fail you all…. When they get done with us, they’re coming for you.”
And, a year ago, the person responsible for much of the chaos in the country for the past decade, assumed the Oval Office again, and the situation has become predictably worse. Expecting the sports world to rise up and address these challenges feels like a lost cause this time. Last summer, the Los Angeles Dodgers tried to stand up to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, but it felt performative and convenient. So, as the NBA All-Star Game and World Cup games, with their international audiences, draw near, the Super Bowl is an example of how high the stakes are, especially because the halftime show is headlined by an international megastar who raps in Spanish as an American citizen.
“We will find you and apprehend you and put you in a detention facility and deport you. Know that is a very real situation under this administration, which is contrary to how it used to be,” Trump’s former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said last year, when it was announced that ICE agents would be at the Super Bowl.
When Super Bowl 60 is behind us, the NBA and March Madness will take center stage. This will bring a sport filled with a lot of Democratic athletes, as proved by polling data, back into the spotlight, with its stars expected to speak truth to power from their platforms. It also means that those who share the same skin color as the oppressed again must protect themselves and their communities while still being marginalized.
Do you want to see change? Don’t ask Minnesota Timberwolves star Anthony Edwards about what’s going on in Minneapolis. Save those inquiries for Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy, T-wolves head coach Chris Finch, or Twins pitcher Joe Ryan. White athletes deserve to be asked about social issues, too.
“PR (public relations) has tried, but I’m not going to sit here and give some politically correct. … Every day, I wake up and see the news, and I’m horrified,” San Antonio Spurs star Victor Wembanyama said recently. “It’s crazy that some people might make it sound like it’s acceptable, like the murder of civilians is acceptable. I read the news and sometimes I’m asking very deep questions about my own life. But you know, I’m conscious also that saying everything that’s on my mind would have a cost that’s too great for me right now. So I’d rather not get into too many details.”
If a French NBA star is publicly saying that advocating for social issues isn’t worth the risk, how can we expect American athletes — particularly Black ones — to step up and help this country confront its problems, again — especially considering that America has never made an effort to protect them?
That’s a rhetorical question.
Carron J. Phillips is an award-winning journalist who writes on race, culture, social issues, politics, and sports. He hails from Saginaw, Michigan, and is a graduate of Morehouse College and Syracuse University.
Until a majority of whites, millionaire athletes or not, speak out, I don't feel anything will ever change.
As long as police brutality and economic stagnation only affected brown and black Americans, white Americans didn't care. Now the GOP has unleashed institutional brutality on all Americans. The ultrawealthy have ensured that their numbers will remain limited. Inflation, job losses, and skyrocketing health costs will keep the working classes battling to stay above water. But Americans have not forgotten the US Constitution and will do our best to end the GOP descent into barbarism.