The Chiefs want to turn Arrowhead Stadium into a voting location this November
The aftermath of a Super Bowl title has been overshadowed by one of the most unusual and unpredictable summers in NFL history.
Kansas City is not immune.
Rather than an offseason defined by a championship celebration, the Chiefs have been occupied instead with real-world issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, deciding whether to allow fans at home games, furthering discussions with Native Americans on traditions like headdresses and the chop, as well as Black Lives Matter and voter registration.
Chiefs team president Mark Donovan spoke with the media on a Zoom call Wednesday, addressing all of those topics.
Below are his comments on turning Arrowhead Stadium into a voting location, as well as social justice causes, edited for length and clarity. You can find his comments on the plan for fans in the stands here and the ban on Native American imagery here.
• Quarterback Patrick Mahomes and safety Tyrann Mathieu have pledged to become involved in voter registration movements. As part of their objectives, they said they have spoken with Donovan, as well as Chiefs chairman and CEO Clark Hunt.
On Wednesday, Donovan said the organization is trying to make Arrowhead Stadium a polling location in November.
“Voting registration and voter engagement, I personally believe, is very important. And people exercising their right to vote, I personally believe, is very important. I think Patrick, Tyrann, others, I’m really proud to be associated with those guys in their efforts. I appreciate that they mentioned we’ve had those discussions, and I’ve been in those discussions. We have some plans to do things in and around this election that are going to be focused on, number one, awareness of the importance of voting; number two, creating awareness of the ways people can register to vote, the ways people can engage and doing that through the experts in that space.
“We have a plan right now, which is not final, and I’ll share it with you all that we’re committed to doing it, but it has some challenges — we want to make Arrowhead a polling location. We want to create an opportunity for people to come to Arrowhead and vote. In addition to that, with the awareness, you’re going to see a lot of things around the highest points of awareness for us as an organization that are going to be focused on voting, the awareness of voting and ways to vote.
“One of the reasons that I personally and I think this organization believes that’s a platform we need to get behind is the beauty of the vote. You can have different opinions. You can vote for different people. But vote. And that’s really what we’re trying to engage in.”
• In the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, sports leagues have embraced moments of protest and solidarity among players. The NFL has yet to play a game since Floyd, a Black man, died while in police custody after a white cop knelt on his neck for nearly 9 minutes.
Mahomes and Mathieu joined other NFL stars in releasing a Black Lives Matter video aimed at garnering the league’s support for the movement, which it later received. The Chiefs also released a statement of support.
Asked how the organization might be involved in any future player demonstrations on the field, Donovan said, “I go back to some of the things we said when all of this started to become as big of an issue as it’s become. It’s definitely something that needs to be addressed. It’s definitely something that needs our attention. If you go back to the end of May or beginning of June, we sat and talked about this as an organization — players, coaches, football operations staff, our own executive staff. And we made a decision to shut our website down and just say (that) right now the important thing is to one of our principles — unite our community. Unity is more important now than ever, and we need to continue to do that. And that’s been our theme.
“When the players’ video came out early in this process, I was really proud to be part of the team that we’ve got to support this; we’ve got to go out with a statement. I believe we were the first team in the National Football League to respond to that video. I’m most proud of the message we sent that night. It was late at night. It was Clark (Hunt), myself and a few others on a phone call, just saying, the message we want people to hear and the message we want our players to hear is that we love and support them. We’re part of a family. Just like any family, there are passions on all sides. What we’ve said is, in discussions that I’ve had with our players, with Clark, with Coach (Andy Reid), with (general manager) Brett (Veach) and with others, let’s love each other, let’s support each other and let’s respect each other. That’s really what we’re going to continue to do. We’re going to meet and have more discussions about this. And you’ll be hearing more from us as we go. But that’s the approach we take to issues like this.”
This story was originally published August 26, 2020 at 4:26 PM.