A California Republican who served in the U.S. Marine Corps, played NFL football, and who’s currently running for U.S. Congress held nothing back on his opinion of former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick in a recent fundraising email, in which he slammed Kaepernick as a “national disgrace.”
According to Fox News , Jeremy Staat made it abundantly clear that he’s not a fan of the former San Francisco 49ers star, who hasn’t played a single snap in pro football since 2016. He told his supporters that he believes Kaepernick is a “national disgrace and I’m tired of seeing him celebrated like he’s a hero.”
During an appearance on Fox News’ Fox & Friends , Staat doubled down on his opinion, claiming that Kaepernic “knew what he was getting into when he decided to kneel and now he’s going to go ahead and capitalize,” which was a jab at Kaepernick’s prior activism on the football field.
Kaepernick was one of the first NFL players who sparked the “take a knee” protest, in which players would kneel during the playing of the pre-game national anthem in protest of police brutality and social injustices taking place across the nation. At the time, there were an increased number of police-related incidents that gained national attention.
Like many other critics of the former quarterback, Staat accused Kaepernick of jumping into social justice activism for personal gain and “essentially extorting the black community and using Nike as his little shiny horse, if you will, to ride in on.”
That attack was in reference to a lucrative deal Kaepernick landed last year with sports apparel giant Nike, which Yahoo sports reporter Charles Robinson said in a tweet was a “star deal on par with a top end NFL player,” while revealing it was worth “millions per year” with royalties included.
Staat’s attack came in the wake of Kaepernick’s attendance at the annual “Indigenous People’s Sunrise Ceremony,” an event held on Alcatraz Island to recognize the occupation of the island by Native Americans. The event is also known as “unthanksgiving.”
Kapernick tweeted about the event while he was there, writing that “The US government has stolen over 1.5 billion acres of land from Indigenous people. Thank you to my Indigenous family, I’m with you today and always.”
Most recently, Kaepernick grabbed national attention after he switched up the details of a highly-anticipated NFL-sponsored private workout that was originally off limits to the media. All 32 NFL teams were invited to see if the former quarterback still had the skills to play at the top level.
At the last minute, however, Kaepernick’s camp was reportedly unhappy with the idea of not having the media in attendance and switched the venue to a high school football field. Only a small number of scouts turned up for the workout and some analysts, according to The Inquisitr , said that the debacle could have cost the former player a shot at once again playing in the league.
