LeBron James has had harsh words about Donald Trump in the past, but on Thursday his own entertainment company released a video that contained his strongest criticism yet of the 45th president.
James famously called Trump a “bum” in a tweet last year, and he’s doubled down on that criticism in the months that followed by speaking out about his inaction after white supremacist protests in Charlottesville and beyond. His latest comments about Trump come in a video put out by Uninterrupted on Thursday called Rolling With The Champion in which Cari Champion interviewed he and Kevin Durant while driving them around in an Uber.
Champion took the opportunity to as the two about Trump and racism, and LeBron said Trump doesn’t “doesn’t understand the people” at first, but later said he doesn’t “give a f*ck about the people” he was elected to help.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtNWc1AIU20
“The number one job in America,” James said, referring to the president. “Doesn’t understand the people. And really don’t give a f*ck about the people.”
James continued, noting that hearing Trump talk is “laughable” and “scary” and talked about the role the president should have as an inspiration to people, something he feels Trump is not currently doing.
“When I was growing up there were like three jobs that you looked to for inspiration, or you felt like these would give me life,” LeBron said. “It was the president of the United States. It was whoever was the best at sports. And then it was the greatest musician at the time. You never thought you could be them, but you could grab inspiration from them.”
James, now considered by many the best athlete in the country, now says his job is to let people know what the president is saying and doing isn’t right for many of the people in America.
“While we cannot change what comes out of that man’s mouth,” James said, “we can continue to alert the people that watch us, that listen to us that ‘this is not the way.’”
Durant, for his part, also criticized the president but in much softer terms, saying “our team, as a country, is not [run] by a great coach.”
It’s important to note that this is not an off-the-cuff response from James that he might not want the general public to hear. Uninterrupted is his company, creating content he’s he heavily involved in. And that means he wants people to know he’s no fan of the president and has serious concerns about his priorities as Commander in Chief.
