Former NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith said that when President Donald Trump was attacking NFL players for their social justice protests and calling for fans to stop watching the NFL during the 2017 season, the league was never worried about losing viewership.
“I don’t ever think that the league was concerned about someone’s ability to effectuate a ban ever,” Smith said on the Sporticast podcast. “I don’t think that they lose sleep over that at all and rightly so.”
In 2017, Trump harshly criticized NFL players for kneeling during the national anthem, calling for the league to change its policy—which it did in 2018 during the offseason. Smith, who led the NFL players union from 2009 until June 2024, said that he was shocked that the league’s owners were suddenly capitulating to the president.
“I was having conversations with owners during that time, and I would say, ‘Why do you care?’” Smith said. “I mean, we’ve got players who are exercising their right of free speech, but man, we’re not losing any revenue; more people might be watching now because of it. Why all of a sudden?
“I couldn’t shake why did they care, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it wasn’t that they didn’t care. I came to the conclusion that there were a majority of owners who cared to make sure that their own political beliefs were being exercised.”
Trump has a complicated history with the league. He owned the New Jersey Generals of the USFL in the early 1980s and pushed the fledgling league to sue the NFL to force a merger. The merger never happened and the USFL folded in 1986. He also expressed interest in buying several NFL teams over the years, most recently as 2014 when he put up a nonbinding offer for the Buffalo Bills. (Terry Pegula purchased the Bills for $1.4 billion.)
This past Sunday, Trump became the first sitting president to attend the Super Bowl in person. He briefly met with commissioner Roger Goodell prior to kickoff and left the game early. It remains to be seen if he’ll extend an invitation to the Philadelphia Eagles to visit the White House, one that could come seven years after he disinvited the team when most players said they would not come for the customary championship team visit.
You can listen to the full Sporticast interview with Smith tomorrow morning on all major podcasting platforms.
