Stephen Curry says the Golden State Warriors should decline an invite to the White House because the basketball team has a chance to “send a statement.”
Curry, the two-time NBA MVP, told a press conference Friday that he thinks the Warriors can “inspire some change” by not going to the White House.
“I don’t want to go,” he said, as reported by the Guardian.
The 2017 NBA champions haven’t yet received an invite to the capital.
“By acting and not going, hopefully that will inspire some change when it comes to what we tolerate in this country and what is accepted and what we turn a blind eye to.
“It’s not just the act of not going there. There are things you have to do on the back end to actually push that message into motion.”
He isn’t the only one who feels this way. Last month, Warriors small forward Kevin Durant said he would decline attending.
“I don’t respect who’s in office right now,” he told ESPN at the time. “That’s just me personally, but if I know my guys well enough, they’ll all agree with me.”
Warriors small forward Andre Iguodala has also said he wouldn’t show up if the team got an invite.
The Chicago Cubs, who won the 2016 World Series, visited U.S. President Donald Trump in the White House in June.
Most of the 2017 Super Bowl champions the New England Patriots visited in April, , but more than 30 players, including star quarterback Tom Brady, were not in attendance.
Brady said he was dealing with a “personal family matter,” the White House said Wednesday, and did not travel to Washington, D.C., to attend the ceremony.
Several members of the team, including high-profile players like defensive end Chris Long and running back LeGarrette Blount pledged to boycott the trip as a political statement against the Trump administration.
The president of the 2017 Stanley Cup Champions, the Pittsburgh Penguins, said the hockey team wouldn’t decline an invite from the White House, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported in June.
*With files from Andrew Russell