The New, Woke NBA League Is Becoming Directly Involved in Elections
One could not be faulted for mistaking the National Basketball Association for a left-wing political action committee.
Liberal basketball star LeBron James’ effort to turn NBA arenas into polling places serves as just the latest example of the sports league putting its wokeness on full display.
According to Fox News, James, the current Los Angeles Laker who formed a voting rights group called More Than A Vote, is “joining with other professional basketball leaders and Michigan’s top elections official to push for mega voting sites to accommodate in-person balloting amid the COVID-19 pandemic.”
So far, NBA venues in Detroit and Atlanta have already signed on to serve as polling locations for the November elections.
The Detroit Pistons have offered use of the complex that also houses the team’s headquarters and practice facilities.
We are partnering with @michsos office and City Clerk of Detroit’s Office on a series of initiatives to drive voter awareness and participation.
The @HenryFordNews Detroit Pistons Performance Center will serve as a voting center for the November 3 election. pic.twitter.com/H6OaQgb5XR
— Detroit Pistons (@DetroitPistons) July 1, 2020
The State Farm Arena, home of the Atlanta Hawks, will also be used as a polling place:
One week ago today it was announced that @StateFarmArena will become the largest-ever polling location in Georgia. Hawks CEO, Steve Koonin reflects on what inspired the Hawks, State Farm Arena and Fulton County (@fultoninfo).
Read more: https://t.co/Nagbx5zFEu pic.twitter.com/RM6VXRKXmD
— Atlanta Hawks (@ATLHawks) July 6, 2020
As Fox News reported, liberals cried foul when Kentucky elections officials opened two huge arenas in the state for June primary voting in June — the Louisville Exposition Center and the University of Kentucky football stadium in Lexington. However, now that James, a prominent left-winger, has jumped on board, the left has changed its tune.
The NBA’s latest venture into the political sphere comes not long after reports surfaced that the league would paint the phrase “Black Lives Matter” on the courts of the three Orlando, Florida, arenas that will house NBA games for the remainder of the 2019-20 season.
The NBA’s embrace of the Black Lives Matter movement gives the impression that the league agrees with the notion that America is a fundamentally racist country. NBA executives and players do not realize how good they have it here in the United States.
As Kentucky State University political science professor Wilfred Reilly pointed out in an interview with conservative talk show host Mark Levin, the NBA serves as a perfect rebuttal to the claim that America suffers from “systemic racism.”
After all, the NBA is made up of predominantly black athletes in a country where blacks are a numerical minority. The NBA doesn’t favor athletes because of their skin color, just their talent, Reilly said. The United States as a whole is the same way, he said.
If the NBA really cared about promoting the idea of racial equality, then it would not work so hard to cozy up to China, one of the most racist societies on the planet.
Yet, the NBA, including LeBron James, came to China’s defense in the fall after Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey sent out a tweet supporting pro-democracy protesters in the semi-autonomous region of Hong Kong.
It’s not just the NBA that has succumbed to woke politics. The National Football League, which has also expressed interest in offering its facilities as “mega voting sites,” announced last week that it would play the “Black National Anthem” before football games.
Former NFL executive Scott Pioli made a presentation last week at meeting of the National Association of Secretaries of State, proposing the use of professional and college sports facilities as voting locations throughout the country.
— Jeff Zillgitt (@JeffZillgitt) July 1, 2020
In addition, NFL player Malcolm Jenkins, now with the New Orleands Saints, has joined CNN as a “social justice contributor” and the San Francisco 49ers recently put up a Black Lives Matter flag alongside the American flag. So much for the idea of sports as an escape from politics.
The political activism of both the NBA and NFL should raise questions about their true motivations for setting up these “mega voting sites.”
The country has come a long way in creating polling places where voters can make their voices heard without fear of harassment or intimidation from partisan interests.
With less than four months to go until Election Day, it remains to be seen how many more NBA and NFL teams will decide to offer their facilities to be used as polling places.
Regardless of what happens in this regard, it seems almost certain that both leagues will continue to battle it out for first prize in the “Wokeness Olympics.”
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