When you think of the President of the United States, words like humanitarian, altruistic and level-headed come to mind.
However, that is not the case with current U.S. President Donald Trump, who recently took to Twitter to insult NBA superstar and Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James, calling the four-time league MVP unintelligent.
While James himself has not responded to the comment made by Donald Trump, many current and former players have come to James’ defense, including six-time NBA champion Michael Jordan.
“I support LJ,” Jordan said in a statement to NBC News on Saturday. “He is doing an amazing job for his community.”
Current players such as Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry, Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell, Karl Anthony-Towns from Minnesota, and Detroit Pistons forward Anthony Tolliver took to twitter to defend and stand with James.
https://twitter.com/StephenCurry30/status/1025808660637745152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1025808660637745152&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.espn.com%2F
https://twitter.com/spidadmitchell/status/1025719952739844098?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1025719952739844098&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.espn.com%2F
https://twitter.com/ATolliver44/status/1025612469178458112?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1025612469178458112&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.espn.com%2F
https://twitter.com/KarlTowns/status/1025612352769671168?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1025612352769671168&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.espn.com%2F
CNN’s Don Lemon, the man who conducted James’ most recent interview, also took to Twitter to defend James saying, “Who’s the real dummy? A man who puts kids in classrooms or one who puts kids in cages?”
In the interview with Lemon, James stated that he felt Trump “was using sports to kinda divide us.” Ironically enough, the NBA community displayed unity and rallied to defend James after Trump’s tweets surfaced on Friday night.
Trump has publicly advocated that the NFL players who protest the National Anthem should be fired and even referred to the protesters as “sons of b#tches.” Trump has also been criticized for retracting a White House invitation to the 2017 NBA Champion Golden State Warriors after players like Curry and Kevin Durant stated they had little to no interest in visiting the White House with Trump in office.
In response to the retracted White House invitation in 2017, James defended Curry and the Warriors calling the president a “bum” and stated, “Going to the White House was a great honor before you showed up.”
