Nike’s ad with Colin Kaepernick is powerful stuff. But Nike is also flexing its muscle to keep Republicans in control of Congress in the 2018 elections.
While aligning its public brand with Kaepernick, Nike is heavily funding the very political party whose conservative ideology is hostile to the entire Black Lives Matter movement. Seen in this light, the new Nike ad with Kaepernick is nothing more than propaganda.
According to the Center for Responsive Politics, in the 2018 campaign cycle, Nike employees and its political action committee contributed a total of $424,600 to Republicans and $122,400 to Democrats in Congress. 78 percent of Nike contributions went to Republicans and 22 percent to Democrats.
Graphic from Center for Responsive Politics
In 2018, the bulk of Nike money went to two major Republican campaign efforts: $189,600 to the National Republican Congressional Committee and $123,100 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee. (2016 marked a brief deviation from a longstanding pro-Republican trend for Nike contributors.)
If there’s any doubt about what these two Republican committees are trying to do, take a look at their homepages:
Nike contributions: $189,600 to the National Republican Congressional Committee
Nike contributions: $123,100 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee:
In contrast, Nike contributed a paltry $20,922 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
As with many corporations, Nike-sourced contributions flow to both Democratic and Republican politicians through its political action committee (PAC) and individual employees. But when it comes to the big picture — who controls Congress — Nike donors are disproportionately funding a Republican Party victory.
It is worth noting that 32% of Nike campaign dollars went directly to individual officeholders instead of the above campaign committees. And interestingly enough, a small majority of those specific dollars went to Democrats in Congress. As of the reporting date of August 21, 2018, the company and its staff have contributed $173,848 to individual officeholders, with $94,166 going to individual Democrats and $79,400 going to individual Republicans.
Many corporations’ PACs and senior executives give to both political parties to build support for their legislative goals. But the overall fundraising breakdown speaks for itself. Nike is heavily investing in the Republican Party’s attempt to hold onto Congress.
The hypocrisy is significant: Nike is leveraging Kaepernick’s image to drive sales and profit amidst an anti-Trump movement in America. Meanwhile, Nike’s electoral agenda is to keep the Republican Party in power so that the company can hold onto more of its revenue.
The Republican agenda is, of course, one of cutting taxes for the wealthy, tearing down environmental protections, and undermining worker protections. Many of these efforts increase profits and reduce the “cost” (fair wages, clean air, etc) for doing business in America. Meanwhile, the rest of us suffer from increased pollution, depressed wages, and cuts to critical social programs.
There is a second way in which Nike’s Kaepernick ad is a particularly distasteful form of propaganda.
The athletes profiled in the ad are drawn from a number of overlapping backgrounds: people of color, women, refugees, Muslims, and people with disabilities. The ad implicitly stands shoulder to shoulder with many of the communities in the cross-hairs of Trump’s terrible agenda.
What makes this ad propaganda is that the Nike political agenda is to preserve the very Republican power structure that makes it possible for Trump to carry out his attacks on these communities.
Nike is in essence running three overlapping campaigns in America:
- The Nike propaganda campaign to identify itself with Colin Kaepernick and, implicitly, “the Resistance.”
- The Nike lobbying campaign to push its business agenda in Congress with both Republicans and Democrats.
- The Nike political campaign to preserve Republican control of the U.S. government, while keeping some friendly Democrats in Congress happy.
- People on the left are excited to buy Nike shoes, even though 78% of Nike political contributions are flowing to Republican politicians.
- People on the right are burning their Nike shoes, even though Nike is using its profits to protect the Trump agenda.
So far, it’s working.
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The data used in this blog post is from OpenSecrets.org, the website of the Center for Responsive Politics:
“The numbers … are based on contributions from PACs and individuals giving $200 or more ... All donations were made during the 2018 election cycle and were released by the Federal Election Commission. Figures for the current election cycle are based on data released on August 21, 2018 … The organizations themselves did not donate, rather the money came from the organizations’ PACs, their individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals’ immediate families. Organization totals may include subsidiaries and affiliates.”
Checks over stripes? Yeah right 
