There’s precisely one group in the District of Columbia that is happy about President Donald Trump’s demand that the Washington Commanders revert to the name “Redskins”: The progressive activists who want to kill the plan to build the franchise a shiny new stadium.
“I didn’t believe it at first, that he would do something so stupid,” said Adam Eidinger, a leader of the push for a ballot initiative that would forbid a new stadium. “They’re destroying the chance of bringing the stadium, and that’s fine with me because I don’t want a stadium.”
Back in 2020, the NFL team changed its name during the national social-justice uproar following the killing of George Floyd. At the time, D.C. officials and members of Congress said there was no chance of a stadium deal so long as the squad used a dictionary-defined slur against Native Americans. Mayor Muriel Bowser, the leader of the current push to move the team from Northwest Stadium in Maryland to an expensive new one at the site of its former field in the District, was among those who called for a change.
Now, Eidinger said, Trump’s culture-war intrusion could upend the deal by prompting a distracting debate — thus giving his group time to get the no-stadium initiative in place. “Anything that slows it down is good,” Eidinger told me, who opposes the stadium because he thinks the land should be used to build housing and cut into D.C.’s soaring cost of living. “I never thought I’d be happy about him doing something toxic and racist.”
Which may be why people actually working on the fractious negotiations spent Monday gnashing their teeth about the president’s threat to nix the deal if the team doesn’t bring back its old name.
“We’re actively in the middle of negotiations,” said Christina Henderson, a member of the city council and someone who has expressed skepticism about certain aspects of the deal, which involves at least $1 billion in D.C. taxpayer subsidies. “We’re exchanging paper right now. This is just not helpful for either side. Nobody likes this.”
Others in the debate were less inclined to publicly decry the presidential monkey-wrench, insisting Trump’s social-media post about the name didn’t change anything.
“I think the thing we should focus on in D.C. is doing our part,” Bowser said at a Monday morning press conference. “I have worked for the better part of 10 years to get our part completed, including getting control of the land, coming to an agreement with the team, and advancing the fantastic agreement to the council.”
When asked whether she’d withdraw her support if the team reverted to its old name, she said no, then pivoted back to prodding the council to OK the deal.
“I am focused on getting the best stadium deal for District taxpayers and getting the deal across the finish line,” Phil Mendelson, the city council chairman and a skeptic of the proposal to build a stadium with taxpayer subsidies, said in a statement. “I have heard from no – zero – District residents, complaining about the name change or saying this is an issue in connection with the stadium.”
Mendelson’s office noted that meetings about the stadium were proceeding as planned, including one slated for Monday afternoon.
The Commanders didn’t respond to a request for comment. The team’s owner said earlier this year that the name wasn’t changing.
A longtime District hand familiar with the Commanders side of the negotiations said Trump’s weekend post about the team name represented something that has been a nightmare scenario for the stadium push: That Congress and the White House would re-open the deal that the local government and the franchise have put together, potentially adding all sorts of new complications to the plans.
“What if Trump wakes up today and is like, ‘Ya know what, eff it, I’m going to do something,’” the insider said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing negotiations. “That’s the risk. It’s always been the risk, that he’s going to get involved and fuck things up.”
Case in point: Charles Allen, one of the city council’s biggest critics of the stadium deal, said he thought the number of colleagues trying to get to yes would change materially if the team acceded to Trump’s demands. “The council has made very clear that that is a team name of the past,” he said. He viewed Trump’s threat, like a recent letter from Rep. James Comer insisting that the council move faster, as part of a pressure campaign to rubber-stamp a deal under which “we are giving too much away and getting too little in return. “
Indeed, some champions of the deal see Trump’s intervention as a spur to hustle things up — the exact opposite of what Eidinger thinks will happen. “I urge the city council to move expeditiously and get this thing done before some unforeseen event causes the entire project to go off the tracks,” said Jack Evans, a former D.C. Council member and longtime champion of stadium projects.
It’s also not entirely clear exactly how Trump would carry through on his threat to nix the deal unless the team reverts to its old name.
The stadium would sit on federal property. But Congress agreed in January to lease it to the D.C. government to develop. Bowser’s administration and the team then settled on a plan to build a new facility using D.C. taxpayer funds alongside private money. Some councilmembers have objected, leading to some expressions of congressional displeasure. Yet the general feeling was that it was on a glide path to eventually passing.
There’s nothing in the deal that requires presidential approval. Like any piece of D.C. legislation, it can be overruled by a vote of Congress, but that would be subject to a Senate filibuster, making it highly unlikely.
On the other hand, Trump could have his appointees to the obscure boards that oversee D.C. planning hold up the stadium on ostensibly unrelated grounds — much as his appointees to the National Capital Planning Commission have threatened an investigation into the new Federal Reserve headquarters in the midst of Trump’s policy fight with Fed chair Jerome Powell. Or he could simply order the government to break its lease with the District, something his administration has done plenty of during its nationwide pullback from federal office buildings. That scenario would likely lead to litigation.
And while the White House could turn around and make its own deal with the Commanders, Henderson noted that it would come without the D.C.-funded sweeteners that are crucial to making the money work: “What I’ve said to the team is, If you want to go with Trump, go forth.” she said. “But then you don’t get any local money out of that.”
It comes down to reading the politics of just who needs to sign off on the subsidies for the stadium. Affection for the old name may run pretty strong among longtime fans of the football team, including in some working-class parts of D.C. But it’s in short supply in the D.C. council, one of the more progressive bodies in America.
There’s an irony to Trump’s using the stadium as leverage to restore a team name that many view as racist. Back in 1962, the John F. Kennedy administration did something similar — in order to abolish a team policy that just about everyone viewed as racist.
The then-Redskins were the last segregated team in the National Football League. They only integrated after Interior Secretary Stewart Udall told the ownership that they wouldn’t be able to use what was then known as D.C. Stadium unless they gave up on segregation. The stadium, then under the control of the Interior Department, was eventually renamed after Robert F. Kennedy. It stands at the very location where the Commanders hope to build their new facility.
For his part, Trump didn’t used to think much of presidents butting into team-name decisions. In 2013, after then-President Barack Obama criticized the team’s nickname, the then-Apprentice star fired off a disparaging tweet: “President should not be telling the Washington Redskins to change their name-our country has far bigger problems! FOCUS on them, not nonsense.”
These days, plenty of people sympathetic to the old name wish he’d follow his own advice.
“I think a lot of fans are conflicted,” said Tom Manatos, a lobbyist and longtime Commanders superfan who has been urging citizens to push their city council representatives to approve the stadium. “A lot of fans, regardless of political affiliation, have an affection for the old name. But most fans just want a new stadium and a successful team. There’s a bit of exhaustion. We thought we were done with all the drama.”
