NASCAR: Why Brian France Should Stay Away from Politics

When a sport in general, be it football, basketball, or even soccer, is linked up with a politician (no matter what the party), trouble could be in store for that sport.

Sports and politics are not compatible.

There’s nothing to be gained from a sport linking up with a politician at all, no matter if it’s a presidential candidate or a state senator. They are two topics that need to be kept far, far away from each other because the endorsing of a politician – any politician – could come as a black eye to the sport. There’s a reason we don’t see Roger Goodell or Mark Cuban going to political rallies, and in all honesty Brian France should have kept himself in check as well.

Instead, Brian France, along with David Ragan, Ryan Newman, and Bill and Chase Elliott, all showed up at a Donald Trump rally in Valdosta, Georgia, Monday night.

With the drivers, it’s another thing entirely. Aside from the fact they’re professional race car drivers, they’re really just famous regular people. Sure, David Ragan may endorse Dr. Pepper, or Ryan Newman may endorse Caterpillar construction equipment, but they’re not representing those brands at a presidential rally. They’re just private citizens endorsing their own candidate. That’s one thing entirely, and there is nothing wrong with them exercising their American right.

But it’s different when the NASCAR CEO of all people steps up front and center. By doing that, France publicly linked the sport with Trump, whether he intended to or not. Ryan Blaney and Mike Joy were two individuals who spoke out on Twitter regarding this news.

If there was any question about whether or not this was a personal or professional mistake on France’s behalf, Trump went as far as claiming he had the support of the NASCAR brand.

This is painful for NASCAR and the millions of fans who happen to not be Trump supporters. Did France just look at the prospect of showing up at a Trump rally and for some erroneous reason forget to look at the downside of this? This shows that France views NASCAR as his own personal toy rather than the billion-dollar business it is. He refused to take into consideration how many fans he could alienate by doing this, and that’s excluding the fact that of all candidates, he shows up at a rally for one of the most volatile presidential candidates in recent memory. Again, this has nothing to do with supporting or not supporting Trump, instead it has to be understood that him showing up at Trump’s rally is not nearly the same as him showing up at Lindsey Graham’s rally.

For those not aware, Graham dropped out of the race for the Republican nomination late in December of 2015.

It remains in the air whether or not he wanted to take after that white-haired gnome Bernie Ecclestone, who stated that Vladmir Putin “should run all of Europe.” Like it or not, France’s endorsement of Trump is along the same lines as Ecclestone’s praise of Putin, even if that’s not what he had planned. At this point, it’s another poor decision in a long line of poor decisions on France’s part. It may have been funny long ago, but these days, it’s rough being a NASCAR fan because of France.

Subjectively speaking, did he look at the demographic for Trump’s supporters and think, “Wow, this is the base I’ve been wanting?” Did he somehow think that he could help the sport grow by backing Trump? Because it won’t. It really, really won’t. As difficult as it is to remain unbiased here, France is backing a man who has targeted other races and other minorities since announcing his presidential bid. He’s endorsing a man who wants to build a wall between America and Mexico (Did France forget about Daniel Suarez or the fact that NASCAR also has a division based in Mexico?). He’s instigated hate crimes, he’s stereotyped Jewish people, and he refused to disavow the KKK’s support on CNN.

Somehow France thinks this guy is good for NASCAR?

Personally, I think France should refrain from talking about diversity in NASCAR ever. He talks and talks about the sport’s growth, but when your ideal candidate is a man who considers himself above other races and genders and considers them detrimental to America, that’s when you relinquish any ground to stand on.

Sure, some folks are going to go on and spout that it was France who backed Trump, not NASCAR. What are folks outside of the sport going to see, though? They’re going to see Trump’s tweet that he has NASCAR’s support, sadly. How does that paint the sport? Backwards. It paints us backwards and uneducated. Is that something that the sport needs when it is constantly battling claims of being racist and ignorant?

More racing: Fox And NASCAR Should Be Ashamed Of What Happened In Atlanta

Therefore, France also has no ground to speak on regarding progress in NASCAR. It bears repeating that he screwed up already by endorsing a presidential candidate, but then he goes and supports a polarizing candidate at that. Yeah, the France family has a long history of supporting GOP candidates, and that’s one thing. That’s an American right, whether you like it (or me, for that matter) or not. But I don’t think I can stress this enough, but endorsing Trump sets the sport back fifty years, no matter if Trump wins or loses.

It’s been said before that France’s ideas set the sport back, but this one definitely takes the moniker of his worst idea.