First Liberty Briefing: NFL Players and High School Football Coaches Support Coach Kennedy

Former NFL players, Steve Largent and Chad Hennings along with two Seattle high school coaches filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of Coach Kennedy’s right to take a knee after games.

Thank you for joining us for the First Liberty Briefing, an exclusive podcast where host Jeremy Dys—also First Liberty Senior Counsel—provides an insider’s look at the stories, cases, people and laws that have made America the world’s leader in protecting religious liberty.

You may be familiar with coach Joe Kennedy, the high school football coach at Bremerton High School, who was fired for taking a knee in silent prayer after the game. Recently, he received support from a few other football players and coaches.

First, Steve Largent, a retired Seattle Seahawk and Hall of Famer and Chad Hennings, three-time Super Bowl Champion with the Dallas Cowboys, explained to the court how football coaches were a positive influence on their lives, contending that Bremerton’s actions restrict free speech and impair coach’s ability to serve as role models and mentors to their students.

Hall of Famer or not, we should all seek to defend the right to free speech. It’s central to our American identity as a diverse pluralistic society, where we foster the free exchange of ideas.

Second, from two football coaches at Garfield High School in Seattle – these coaches gained national media attention by joining their team and kneeling during the National Anthem to protest racial injustice. In their Friend of the Court Brief, the coaches asked the court to affirm that the First Amendment protects the right of public employees, including football coaches, to private expression.

If the Constitution protects the right of a football coach to kneel to protest injustice, it certainly protects the right of Coach Kennedy to kneel in prayer.

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