Patrick Mahomes’ efforts to help voter registration is admirable.
Ever since Patrick Mahomes has been a part of the Kansas City Chiefs, he has been very active in the community. 2020 is no exception as Mahomes donated meals to Harvesters and took part in the NFL’s Black Lives Matter video. In addition, Mahomes launched voter registration programs, teaming up with NBA superstar LeBron James in the voter registration drive.
However, some Chiefs fans are unhappy with his involvement in the Black Lives Matter video and fight against black voter suppression. Last week, Mahomes was one of many athletes and celebrities who signed a letter in hopes to end black voter suppression.
As Chiefs fans have learned by now, anything Mahomes says or does hits the local newswire and much of it even stretches to the national media as well. Mahomes is a superstar. Like any player with his stature, Mahomes is using his platform to make a nationwide impact. In doing so, Mahomes has focused on voter registration this year.
On Saturday, two local Kansas City television stations, KMBC and KSHB, shared a story on Facebook about Mahomes signing the letter to fight against black voter suppression ahead of the 2020 election.
You can read the comments from KMBC’s and KSHB’s Facebook pages, which were mostly words of encouragement and support, although there were also some negative comments about what Mahomes is doing.
When Mahomes announced his charity last offseason, he was never told to “stick to sports.” When Mahomes visited the University of Kansas Hospital, helped build tiny homes for veterans, plays video games, or donates to charities, Mahomes isn’t told to “stick to sports.”
Yet when Mahomes starts a voter registration program, there is outrage and disapproval from some Chiefs fans, as you can see from many of the responses to this tweet.
Mahomes has never publicly stated any allegiance to a political party or candidate, which he is certainly allowed to do, but he has made his ideals public for anyone to see. In an interview with Peter King, Mahomes made it clear that while football is his passion, there are more important things in the world.
"Football is obviously super important, but helping out the world is more important and we’re going to try to do that every single day.I love football, but I love trying to make the world a better place even more."
Mahomes told King that with his platform, he has the ability to speak and he hopes that people will listen to him, even if they disagree. Mahomes called it his “job” and “duty” to speak up on these matters.
"Hopefully I have the support of all of the fans that have been with me since the beginning. If I don’t, then those fans weren’t true fans of Patrick Mahomes. They were just fans of what I did on the football field. I really respect the people, whether they have the same beliefs as me or not, they are still going to support me for the person that I am every single day."
Outside of making a lot of money and having a big platform, Mahomes is no different than any of us. We all have our opinions on politics. Some of us choose to share them. While Mahomes has not shared specifically who he will vote for yet, he has crossed the realm of a social movement and voter registration.
As long as he isn’t hurting anyone in the process, he shouldn’t have to face any backlash for it. Agree or disagree, let’s respect that.