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The only Major League Baseball player to take a knee during the national anthem said a pro-Trump waiter would not serve him at a restaurant in his hometown of Harvest, Alabama. (Video below)
Oakland A’s catcher Bruce Maxwell told TMZ Sports about what happened to him after he kneeled in an anti-police protest.
Maxwell took a knee during the national anthem on Sept. 23.
Maxwell claimed he was “racially profiled” by being refused service. Although he didn’t say that the waiter wouldn’t serve him because of his race, but only mentioned his kneeling during the anthem.
“He denied us service at lunch. They had to get us another waiter to wait on our table,” Maxwell said.
“He was, ‘Oh. Yeah. You are that guy, huh?’” Maxwell said. “I was, ‘Excuse me?’ He said, ‘Yeah. You are the guy who took the knee. I voted for Trump. And I stand for everything he stands for.”
That’s when Maxwell continued to suggest that he was being racially profiled.
“Unless you are subject to it, you won’t understand it,” Maxwell said. “I’m very respectful. I’m very educated. And it still happens to this day. That’s the reason why I’m kneeling. Stuff like that.”
The anti-police protests have not caught on in baseball.
Former MLB pitcher Ron Darling said the reason the protests in baseball were limited to just Maxwell was because the clubhouse is different in baseball than the NFL.
“Unless baseball’s clubhouses have changed since I played, and I know they haven’t, it’s a very conservative base,” Darling told the Mercury News.
In September, former MLB player David Winfield told TMZ that he thought the protests should continue.
“It’s a new era — new causes, new objections to the way things are … it’s a protest we should listen to,” Winfield said. The Hall of Famer added, “Nothing changes overnight. Keep doing what you’re doing.”
You can see the video of Maxwell’s racial profiling claims here: