Next season, NFL players and personnel will be prevented from protesting racial injustice on the sideline while the national anthem is being played, the league announced Wednesday. The new rule mandates that players on the field must stand while the anthem is being played. It also eliminates a requirement in place since 2009 that players be on the field before the game, allowing them to protest instead in the locker room.
Amid the initial reaction over the league’s new rule, it was hard to find much support beyond a majority of the league’s owners and vice president Mike Pence, who tweeted out a screenshot of CNN’s homepage along with “#winning.