Renewed debate over the National Football League’s national anthem policy is already rippling into the midterm elections.
In Missouri, where Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill is considered one of the upper chamber’s most vulnerable Democratic incumbents, her likely Republican rival Josh Hawley has sided with the NFL.
In a radio interview Thursday morning, Hawley called the NFL’s controversial decision “long overdue.”
“I’m glad that the NFL has finally come around to the idea that the flag represents our country, those who have sacrificed for our country, the history of our country,” Hawley explained. “And I can say, as somebody who had family fight in Vietnam – my uncle proudly served our country in the Vietnam conflict … my sister wears the uniform of the United States – she’s a Lieutenant Commander in the United States Navy … that flag means something to me, it means something to my family, and this is the right thing to do.”
In states like Missouri, where President Trump won by nearly 20 percent of the vote in 2016, Republican candidates seize eagerly on flare-ups in the culture war. Over in Indiana, failed GOP primary Senate candidate Rep. Luke Messer’s campaign circulated a petition “blasting the NFL for refusing to run an ad from a veterans’ group urging football players to stand for the national anthem,” as my colleague Philip Wegmann reported back in January.
“Whether it is refusing to stand for the national anthem, radical pro-abortion positions, or the disrespect shown at the State of the Union, national Democrat leaders are doing everything they can to make 2018 a brutal year for their vulnerable incumbents up states that Trump won,” a Republican communicator familiar with the 2018 campaigns told me in February.
The debate over the NFL’s anthem policy is electric, and shows no signs of fading into the background of the news cycle for now. It’s safe to expect more Republican hopefuls like Hawley — running in states where the president is popular, or where there’s signs of an enthusiasm gap — to weigh in on the matter.
And with NFL season set to start back up in the homestretch of campaign season, Republicans could be looking at another opportunity to rally the base come September.
