Brandon Marshall and Denver police chief discuss racial issues
Denver Broncos linebacker Brandon Marshall has been joining Colin Kaepernick in protesting the national anthem. Now, he is ready to do more than protest.
A protest is only as strong as the actions that follow to back it up. Denver Broncos linebacker Brandon Marshall is making sure his national anthem protest is not just an empty gesture. On Tuesday, he met with Denver Police Chief Robert White and discussed racial issues.
According to the Denver Post, Marshall and White met for over an hour and discussed questions about law enforcement, racial profiling, and police training practices. White then offered Marshall some suggestions for how he could continue growing his outreach and impact in the community. The police chief hopes to involve Marshall alongside his officers in efforts to effect change and improve racial relations in Denver.
“There are a lot of people that will raise issues and be negative and be what my kids call just ‘haters,’ no matter what you do and let it go at that,” White said after meeting with the NFL star.
“(Marshall) has issues and he has questions as it relates to what we’re doing. He acknowledged some of those challenges, and he wants to do something about it. And part of doing something about it is going to the source of where you think some of those issues are.”
White and Marshall had a very productive discussion, touching not only on police relations with the general population, but also the Denver PD’s emphasis on valuing human lives over the legality of police actions. White also provided Marshall with several reports that will allow the linebacker to glean a deeper understanding of national policing policies.
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White also encouraged Marshall to participate in a ride-along with an officer and to test out the department’s training simulator that will allow him to be placed in “don’t shoot” and “shoot” scenarios. Most importantly, Marshall will continue engaging local grade-school students.
“This was an opportunity, to use a football analogy, to ‘move the ball forward,’” White said. “We can never address the issues that we’re faced with in this country if, No. 1, we don’t have respect for the other side of the table and, No. 2, we can’t find some common ground to move forward. From my perspective, I wanted to hear what he had to say. But I also wanted to represent law enforcement from a positive perspective, but also acknowledge that we have problems and also assure him that we are aggressively trying to get our arms around those problems.”