Colin Kaepernick #7 of the San Francisco 49ers (Image: Getty)
Colin Kaepernick‘s attorneys are reportedly seeking to subpoena President Donald Trump in the case of Trump working with the NFL to penalize players who protest the national anthem.
According to the Huffington Post, the free-agent quarterback’s legal team is hoping to “compel testimony from Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and other officials familiar with the president’s agenda on protesting NFL players.”
Last week, NFL team owners confessed Trump influenced the league’s decision to fine players who kneeled or sat for The Star-Spangled Banner before games, a move Kaepernick first started in August 2016 to make a statement about racial inequality and police brutality against minorities in the U.S.
Trump and other notable conservatives have frequently slammed players for this behavior, calling them unpatriotic. During the wave of Kaepernick-inspired protests last season, the president said that if he was in charge of an NFL team, he would say of players like the former San Francisco 49ers QB: “Get that son of a bitch off the field! You’re fired!”
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In October 2017, Kaepernick filed a grievance against the NFL, accusing all 32 team owners of colluding to keep him out of the league. Kaepernick was released by the 49ers in March 2017. His former teammate, safety Eric Reid, also participated in anthem protests and filed his own collusion grievance in May after he was cut by the team.
Pro Football Talk reported in May that “internal franchise documents generated as part of the free-agency evaluation process and testimony from witnesses harvested via depositions in the collusion litigation has established that teams viewed Kaepernick as being good enough not simply to be employed by an NFL team, but to be a starting quarterback for an NFL team.”
There could be concern that Trump’s lawyers will simply try to fight any subpoenas Kaepernick issues, just as they have disputed subpoenas special counsel Robert Mueller has dealt as part of the Russia probe. Trump and his legal team said in a 20-page letter that the president has the executive authority to shut down any investigations about him at any time.
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