NBC sportscaster Bob Costas on Monday slammed President Donald Trump for his comments about NFL players who don’t stand for the national anthem, saying, “Patriotism comes in many forms.”
Costas, appearing on “New Day,” defended former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who chose to kneel during the anthem to protest the treatment of black people by police officers and sparked Sunday’s protest by NFL teams.
“Patriotism comes in many forms, and what has happened is it’s been conflated with a bumper-style kind of flag-waving, and with the military only, so that people cannot see that in his own way (how) Colin Kaepernick, however imperfectly, is doing a patriotic thing,” he said. “And so, too, are some of these other players.
“Martin Luther King was a patriot. Susan B. Anthony was a patriot. Dissidents are patriots. Schoolteachers and social workers are patriots,” Costas said.
Costas also said it was clear that Trump had more fervor in attacking football players for kneeling during the anthem then he did in condemning the white nationalists who took part in the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia.
“Clearly the president had more passion and conviction for those remarks (about NFL players) … then he did for distancing himself from white nationalists,” Costas said.
Watch the entire interview below.
