Tom Brady spoke to reporters ahead of Super Bowl LV, which can be seen for free this Sunday. And while he replied to most of the questions with no issues, there was one where he didn’t give a straight answer. Nancy Armour of USA Today asked the Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback about not being criticized for his support of former President Donald Trump.
“I’m not sure how to respond to hypothetical like that,” Brady said during the Zoom press conference, as reported by USA Today. “I hope everyone can — we’re in this position like I am to, again, try to be the best I can be every day as an athlete, as a player, as a person in my community, for my team and so forth, so yeah, I’m not sure what else.”
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Tom Brady attempts to answer a question from @nrarmour about whether or not he thinks he would have the same room to weigh in on political and/or borderline controversial topics if he were Black. #SuperBowl pic.twitter.com/m8fTxjlrq1
— USA TODAY Sports (@usatodaysports) February 1, 2021
This stems from former NFL player Shannon Sharpe talking about Brady’s support of Trump on the FS1 show Undisputed. He said: “I understood what Tom was for a very, very long time. He put that hat in there for a reason. ‘Letting you know that I support my friend, Donald Trump, and no matter what he says, I support him.’ … If we like somebody, we’re more forgiving of their actions. We’re more forgiving of their words, their deeds. If we don’t like you, we will go to heaven and earth, we’ll go back 15 years.”
Sharpe then used LeBron James as an example. “Let’s just say for sake of argument, LeBron James says my friend is Minister (Louis) Farrakhan,” Sharpe said, referring to the leader of the Nation of Islam. How would America react? Blacks have always had to be very, very quiet about who our friends are. … LeBron James can never say, a prominent black athlete can never say, Minister Farrakhan is just my friend. They’d try to cancel anybody with the just mere mention of Mister Farrakhan’s name. Because we like Tom Brady.”
When Brady and the Bucs defeated the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Championship game, fans on social media compared Brady’s support for Trump to Colin Kapernick protesting during the national anthem in 2016 which led to him being a free agent after that season. Herschel Walker’s son, Christian, defended Brady by calling Kaepernick a “Powerpuff girl.”
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LeBron James (L) and his family onstage at The 2023 ESPYS held at Dolby Theatre on July 12, 2023 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images)
