A Democratic senator is turning up the heat on the NFL over the Washington Redskins’ name.
Sen. Maria Cantwell announced Tuesday that she will introduce a bill to strip the pro football league’s tax-exempt status over its failure to force the team to change its name, which many Native Americans find offensive, according to the Washington Post.
“The NFL needs to join the rest of Americans in the 21st century,” she said. “It is about right and wrong.”
Cantwell was joined by several tribal chiefs, as well as “Change the Mascot,” a group which includes the national Congress of American indians and the Oneida Indian Nation, calling on the owners of the 31 other NFL teams to force Redskins owner Dan Snyder to change the team’s name.
Washington state has more than three times the average U.S. population of Native Americans, according to the 2013 Census.
