Sports entertainment is becoming increasingly “woke.”
The reporters and hosts who cover sports have also moved in that direction, or they’ve been purged.
Now an NFL broadcaster made one career move that left Democrats speechless.
Long-time NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya is retiring from broadcasting, which is not earth-shattering news.
However, Tafoya made waves when she announced that she would be joining the campaign for Kendall Qualls, a Republican gubernatorial candidate in Minnesota.
Tafoya has long been a moderate with fiscally conservative views.
In an interview with The Athletic, she described herself as a libertarian.
Last year, she made waves when she appeared on The View as the sane right-wing voice pushing back against the onslaught of “woke” insanity.
During that broadcast, Tafoya talked about how her own kids were being segregated by radical teachers in K-12 education.
She said, “Why are we even teaching that the color of the skin matters? Because to me, what matters is your character and your values.”
Tafoya also criticized Colin Kaepernick for comparing the NFL to slavery and pushed back on the co-hosts who said he was being blackballed by the league.
Michele Tafoya gleefully eggs The View crowd to “bring it on” after they groan at her Colin Kaepernick take. pic.twitter.com/46rbGgS0qJ
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) November 3, 2021
After Tafoya’s appearance on The View, she conspicuously disappeared from the NBC broadcast for several weeks.
Sports and culture commentator Bill Simmons speculated that her sudden hiatus was linked to her appearance on the show.
Simmons explained:
“There’s some good conspiracy stuff going on about this…Because she hosted The View at the beginning of November. She was in the conservative seat, then a couple weeks later, all of a sudden, just on a bye. Taking a break…It would be one thing if the show was on 52 weeks a year, but it’s only on 17 weeks a year. Do you need three weeks off during a 17-week season?”
Tafoya said she was stepping away from broadcasting in order to have the freedom to speak on issues that she cares about.
She revealed:
“I got to a point in my life where I wanted to try other things, and there are some things that are really important to me…This is not to say that sports isn’t an important field, that my job isn’t an important job. But in my position, I was not as free to be as vocal about world events that I’m concerned about.”
Tafoya clarified that she was not told by NBC to be quiet, but there was an implicit understanding not to invite controversy, and speaking the truth in a world filled with lies has become controversial.
Tafoya added:
“It’s not because I was told to shut up…I want to be very clear about that. But look, if you’re on a show like ‘Sunday Night Football,’ which is the No. 1 show in primetime for 11 straight years, unprecedented, the last thing they want to do is invite controversy.”
Live sports are the only sure-fire ratings bonanza for advertisers, and the NFL is the biggest television show on five different networks.
That’s why the left is pushing so hard to grab hold of the league.