On a day when ExxonMobil announced record profits for a U.S. company, a group of protesters rallied against the conglomerate spending any of its billions to boost its brand at Nationals Park.
Rallying at the Center Field Plaza on Thursday, the Coalition to Strike Out Exxon at Nationals Park argued that Exxon’s sponsorship of the seventh-inning stretch and its rumored interest in purchasing the stadium’s naming rights dirties the game, undermines the stadium’s “green” credibility and is a sellout to lobbyists.
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“They in fact know exactly who comes to all these ball games,” said coalition member and Greenpeace Research Director Kert Davies. “It is all the lobbyists and all the power brokers here in Washington, and it is a direct avenue to get in those people’s faces and gain some credibility. That makes sense if you are working for Exxon to do it that way, but we know that it is a corruption of the game that we hold and honor in America, and it is no place for Exxon to come in and pollute it with their advertisements.”
Davies said the coalition has already been organizing booing campaigns during the seventh-inning stretch, but the naming rights is what it’s really concerned about.
“When the naming rights are sold and if Exxon gets the rights, the Nationals will be the laughingstock of the league, and the public will be disserviced by allowing this company to taint this green stadium,” he said.
A Nationals spokeswoman declined to comment on the protest.
