Rep. Matt Gaetz Calls on Ending Special Tax Exemption for the NFL Over Anthem Protests

While the NFL isn’t a government-run institution, it does receive a lot of tax subsidies from Uncle Sam.

Taxpayers at all levels of government foot the bill in subsidizing the construction of football stadiums to the total of an estimated $1 billion annually. In just the past decade, we’ve seen a handful of stadiums built in part with your tax dollars, among them being for teams like the Indianapolis Colts (the $720 million Lucas Oil Stadium), the Dallas Cowboys (the $1.15 billion AT&T Stadium), the New York Jets and Giants (the $1.6 billion MetLife Stadium), the Minnesota Vikings (the $1.1 billion U.S. Bank Stadium), the Atlanta Falcons (the $1.5 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium), and the San Francisco 49ers (the $1.3 billion Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara).

Contrary to popular belief, these stadiums don’t even stimulate the local economies where they’re built because most who attend sporting events only visit the stadium, and not the surrounding area. This John Stossel video explains more:

State and local governments still have yet to wake up to the reality of subsidizing sports stadiums, but the federal government might finally be coming to its senses.

While I really wish I wasn’t still writing about NFL protests over a year after Colin Kaepernick started his stunt, President Trump has forced the far-left to show their true colors in supporting the anti-American protests. And Congress is taking notice. According to the Tallahassee Democrat, Florida’s Rep. Matt Gaetz is calling on his fellow congressmen to end the tax-exempt status of the NFL following the rise in National Anthem protests.

Rep. Gaetz endorsed H.R. 296, the Pro Sports Act, that ends the tax-exempt status for professional sports organizations.

Gaetz said that while the players have a right to free speech, they don’t have a right to speech without consequence. “When people kneel during our national anthem, they don’t simply indict the issue with which they have some particular grievance, they indict our country, our service members, our first-responders, our founding fathers and the principles that made this country great” he said to Congress. 

If they don’t like America, perhaps they shouldn’t receive money from its citizens. And even then, why are we subsidizing sports in the first place?

I think billionaires can afford their own stadiums.

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By Matt

Matt is the co-founder of Unbiased America and a freelance writer specializing in economics and politics. He’s been published... More about Matt

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