Doc Rivers has spent a lot of time at Madison Square Garden during his NBA career, but he was disgusted by what he saw from the Donald Trump rally there earlier this week.
Rivers and his Milwaukee Bucks were in Boston to play the Celtics Monday night. And during his pregame press conference, Rivers was asked about his recent campaign work for Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of next week’s election. While responding to the question about his support for Harris, Rivers said his PSA was mostly about encouraging everyone to vote.
“I’m not going to do a ‘Pop’ here today,” Rivers said, referring to San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich, who recently went on a lengthy rant against Donald Trump, calling the former president a “sick” and “damaged” man.
“If you saw Madison Square Garden, I mean come on,” Rivers continued before pausing to show visible disgust. “Like, right?”
“To me, it’s just so important to vote. I’m going to keep it as close to that as possible. But my gosh. I tell people, if the guy was so great, then why did 80 million people vote against him the last time he ran?” Rivers asked of Trump. “I don’t know. I don’t get it. But we gotta do something about — that was atrocious what we saw. If you’re a Black man or a woman, or Brown, Latino or Puerto Rican or — they hit everybody. And it was awful.”
Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally made headlines after comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made several offensive and racist remarks. Hinchcliffe sparked a firestorm of backlash for referring to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage,” joked about Black people carving watermelons and said Latinos “love making babies” so they can “come inside, just like they did to our country.” In the wake of those comments, DraftKings is reportedly evaluating Hinchcliffe’s role as a brand ambassador for the sports betting company.
Rivers, meanwhile, continues to express support for Harris, recently appearing in a strange commercial alongside second gentleman Doug Emhoff, where the NBA coach pretends to draw up a gameplan on how to beat Trump. Rivers will be at Madison Square Garden next week for a Friday night game against the Knicks on Nov. 8, three days after the presidential election.
About Brandon Contes
Brandon Contes is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. He previously helped carve the sports vertical for Mediaite and spent more than three years with Barrett Sports Media. Send tips/comments/complaints to bcontes@thecomeback.com