It might be the same man sitting in The Oval Office, but a lot’s changed since Donald J Trump first presided over a Super Bowl eight years ago.
In 2017 America was perilously divided, with a newly-elected Trump in the White House and protest marches taking place on the streets outside it.
This tension was mirrored in Houston’s Superbowl LI. This was the season when NFL athletes had started taking the knee, and even the much-loved commercials featured thinly veiled political statements like 84 Lumber’s Mexican wall ad.
It marked the beginning of a new age of activism in sport. Politically motivated athletes, backed by purpose-led brands, started standing up for progressive values.
Activism in sport
After Colin Kaepernick, came LeBron James, Lewis Hamilton, Naomi Osaka, Marcus Rashford and many others looking to use their platform to make change. Like it or not, sport was overtly political again.
I, like many people who wrote about this, celebrated it. I argued that sport has always had political power, and athletes should recognise their ability to wield it.
The naive assumption, however, was that this trend would move only in one direction, with sport becoming a growing voice for progressive values in an increasingly progressive society.
Eight years later it’s a different America and a different world.
We’re seeing a backlash to the perceived ‘wokery’ that was normalised over the last decade. The Overton window has shifted and it’s alarming how quickly the pillars of progression are collapsing around us.
Key Trump pillars
Whether it’s a reversal of DE&I (diversity, equity, and inclusion) initiatives or Meta’s rowback of its moderation policy it feels like right-wing populism now has the upper hand. It’s a comeback that somehow manages to be both entirely predictable and utterly surprising at the same time.
In this changing of the winds, sport too has moved to the right – further proof that it can’t be separated from politics no matter how hard we try.
In fact, sport was a key pillar of Trump’s reelection campaign, spearheaded by golf and UFC in particular.
Bryson DeChambeau looked sheepish when a jubilant Trump invited him on stage on election night. Perhaps he had Michael Jordan’s infamous words ringing in his head and was thinking “Democrats buy sneakers too”.
There’s no doubt, however, that Bryson did deserve credit, with his highly effective Breaking 50 video racking up more than 13m views on YouTube alone.
Political masculinity
UFC CEO Dana White was far less reserved in the limelight, accepting the mic and reinforcing the ‘tough guy’ connection. UFC has long-been entwined with a new era of American political masculinity, with fighters like Jim Miller strongly backing the new president through thick and thin.
The Republican connection is no longer contained within the octagon. The Trump celebration dance became a huge trend across the NFL and soccer at the end of last year, with players such as Nick Bosa, Zach Sieler and Christian Pulisic just some of the superstars to join in. It’s a celebration that has also infiltrated American youth sport.
Some athletes like Bosa are doing this with clear intentions – the San Francisco 49ers defensive end was also fined for wearing a Maga hat, but others like Pulisic claimed “it was just a dance… I just thought it was funny”.
Certainly this is the view of the NFL, which has “no issue with a celebratory dance”, but we should be cautious with this.
Super Bowl stunt
These actions may be less overt than taking the knee but it doesn’t mean they aren’t political. As we saw with another Trump champion Elon Musk, it’s easy to play down the importance of gestures, but it’s rarely healthy to do so.
The right side of the political divide has growing confidence to be more vocal and expect sport to be part of that.
An interesting thing to keep an eye on is whether male sport and female sport will diverge on this issue. Across the world we’re seeing the same pattern of a growing ideological divide between men and women, particularly in younger generations.
While women’s sport has a strong connection to LGBTQ+ communities and is very progressive, male sport might be drawn in the other direction. British golfer Charley Hull bucked this trend recently by declaring her admiration for Trump, but she might just be the exception that proves the rule.
What is undeniably true now is that the next political act on the pitch is as likely to come from the right as the left. We’re in a new era of political debate where progressive and populist athletes will battle on the field in more ways than one. Perhaps we’ll even see that as soon as Sunday in Super Bowl LIX?