WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s demand the Washington Commanders NFL team revert to its recently retired “Redskins” name is being laughed off on Capitol Hill — by veteran Democrats from the region, at least.
“We already went through that battle,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) told Raw Story as he was hopping an elevator in the Capitol.
“Let’s stick with what the team’s name is.”
Washington’s professional football team was known as the Redskins from the 1930s, when it moved to the nation’s capital from Boston. In February 2022, after decades of resistance and controversy, including allegations of racism from many Native Americans, a new name was announced: Commanders.
Most all sides were happy to move on.
Under similar pressure at home, other sports teams have changed names in recent years, including the Cleveland Guardians of Major League Baseball, formerly known as the Indians — another target of Trump’s ire.
Polling shows Commanders fans consider the issue settled but this month Trump tried to revive it anyway — a move widely seen as an attempt to distract from the boiling Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
Trump threatened to block the NFL team from moving back into the nation’s capital, with a new home on the site of the old RFK Stadium in the east of the city, after spending the last 28 years in Landover, out in the Maryland suburbs.
Democrats dismiss that threat.
But the president and Congress maintain final say over spending here in the federal city.
And the GOP’s been shamelessly flexing its newfound might on everything from erasing local firearm restrictions to blocking elected officials from regulating recreational cannabis, which voters overwhelmingly approved in a 2014 ballot measure.
‘GET IT DONE!!!’
"The Washington ‘Whatever’s’ should IMMEDIATELY change their name back to the Washington Redskins Football Team," Trump blasted on social media last week, insisting: “There is a big clamoring for this.
"Likewise, the Cleveland Indians, one of the six original baseball teams, with a storied past.
"Our great Indian people, in massive numbers, want this to happen. Their heritage and prestige is systematically being taken away from them. Times are different now than they were three or four years ago. We are a Country of passion and common sense. OWNERS, GET IT DONE!!!"
Elected officials across the region haven’t known whether to laugh, cry or gear up for what promises to be another knock-down, drag-out political brawl over control of the capital.
As of now, Democrats in the region are dismissing Trump out of hand, especially as his administration continues bungling investigations surrounding Jeffrey Epstein — the deceased financier, sex offender and onetime close Trump friend.
“Two things. Number one, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it,” Rep. Kweisi Mfume (D-MD) told Raw Story of the Redskins/Commanders issue, while walking to a closed-door Democratic Caucus meeting.
“And number two, don't give me another story to be distracting from the Epstein story. It's that and all the other things that he seems to be throwing out this week. He's just a factory for lies.”
While Washingtonians have largely moved on, Trump hasn’t. Mfume says the president’s simply out of touch with city residents and America’s ever-evolving — if slowly — cultural.
“Especially when you consider the new ownership of the team, the new feeling within the city, the efforts to work together to rebuild the franchise and to be able to have a good feeling going into the season,” Mfume said. “This distracts from all that.”
Even if the Constitution empowers the president over all things Washington, other Democrats in the region say they aren’t scared.
“A lot of sound and fury signifying nothing — that’s not original to me, by the way,” Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) told Raw Story, nodding to the source of his quote: William Shakespeare, in Macbeth.
“It was a diversionary tactic over the weekend as economic news was not good and Epstein News was even worse. This was just, you know, one of a number of topics that he was throwing up in the air.”
“So you hope,” Raw Story quipped.
“Yeah,” Kaine said as he made his way onto the Senate floor to vote. “So I hope.”
‘More exciting for everyone’
True to form, Trump isn’t backing down.
After his initial posts on Truth Social last weekend, after talking heads across Washington had widely panned his demand, the president had some more to say.
"My statement on the Washington Redskins has totally blown up, but only in a very positive way," the president wrote.
"I may put a restriction on them that if they don’t change the name back to the original ‘Washington Redskins,’ and get rid of the ridiculous moniker, ‘Washington Commanders,’ I won’t make a deal for them to build a Stadium in Washington.
“The Team would be much more valuable, and the Deal would be more exciting for everyone."
