New York Liberty players show support for Kamala Harris in 2024 presidential campaign

Wing Betnijah Laney-Hamilton, forward Kennedy Burke and guard Courtney Vandersloot all showed up for work — and for the cameras — with a white tee that included a black-and-white photo of Vice President Kamala Harris. The shirt also contained the word, emblazoned in a goldish peach script, “Pres.”

When Burke walked to the locker room, she flashed a smile and peace sign for the cameras, looked down at her shirt and put her hands beneath Harris’ face to draw attention to the message. Laney-Hamilton, while holding her phone, placed her hands in a similar way to emphasize the current Vice President and the current Democratic candidate for President of the United States in the upcoming 2024 general election. 

“I mean, I think it’s kind of self explanatory with the election coming up,” Laney-Hamilton said in a press conference following the Liberty’s 70-77 defeat of the Seattle Storm. “Me wearing that shirt with [Harris], you know her being a candidate. So we’re just trying to support who we want to see.” 

Sitting to Laney-Hamilton’s left, Liberty head coach Sandy Brondello pipped in and declared, “that’s right,” in accordance with the statement her player made. This isn’t the first time Brondello has dared to also voice her political beliefs. She’s a strong proponent of gun violence prevention, something she revealed to The Next in 2022. 

But, after both Laney-Hamilton and Jonquel Jones chuckled in amusement at Brondello’s enthusiasm, the Liberty head coach then realized that, as an Australian citizen living in the United States, she unfortunately can’t vote in the upcoming election. “But I don’t vote,” she said more quietly.  

As for Burke, she was also blunt in her reasoning for wearing the shirt. “Vote for Kamala,” she said to a group of reporters about her choice to wear the tee.

When asked where she got the shirt and who designed it, she didn’t have much information to share. She did, however, signal that the shirts came from the Women’s National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA), but she wasn’t completely sure. She noted that her teammate, rookie guard Jaylyn Sherrod, was wearing another shirt from Players Union that read: “In-power women, EMPOWER women.”

The Next has since confirmed that the collection of shirts, including the ones with Harris’ face on them indeed came from the WNBPA. The idea behind them is to give players opportunities to “demonstrate their support” for causes and ideas such as, and not limited to, voting rights, reproductive rights, workers rights and even Harris as a candidate. 

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Across the country in Phoenix on that same Thursday night, Phoenix Mercury center Brittney Griner was pictured warming up prior to her game against the Washington Mystics in a pink, green and black tee that read: “Kamala Harris for the Culture.”

In the past week, players have begun wearing warm up shirts, also from the PA, that just say the word “VOTE.” Players did the same two years ago in 2022 prior to the midterm elections while also trying to advocate for the release of Griner from wrongful detention in Russia. 

With 59 days remaining until citizens cast their ballots, there have been questions about if, and how, the league is going to advocate for and organize around the upcoming election. Expectations are high ever since the events of the 2020 bubble, where the Atlanta Dream and many other members of the WNBA came together to support Reverend Raphael Warnock in a Senate race against former Dream owner Kelly Loeffler. Their efforts eventually helped flip the United States Senate and give it Democratic control. It was on Aug. 4, 2020, of that bubble season when players from the Dream and their opponent, the Mercury, first broke out the infamous “Vote Warnock” shirt for a nationally televised game.

On Aug. 4, 2024, players were either in Paris competing in the Olympics, in their markets participating in a mini training camp or just taking a breather after playing in 25 games in two months time.

But days before WNBA play resumed following the Olympic break last month, The New York Times reported that Storm forward and WNBPA president Nneka Ogwumike would be leading nonprofit More Than a Vote and taking the reins from NBA star LeBron James. The organization has been relatively dormant since it was founded in 2020. Shifting the focus from protecting voting access for Black voters, More Than a Vote in 2024 will now center around women’s and reproductive rights, one of the main issues on the ballot for voters this fall. 

Stephanie Schriock, the new adviser of More Than A Vote, explained that the organization has begun the process of working with athletes to eventually make digital advertisements advocating for reproductive rights. The action on the part of WNBA players, however, has been slow coming out of the gate. 

“A lot of people keep asking me, what is the WNBA going to do, what is the WNBA going to do, and we’re always ready,” Ogwumike told reporters before a game on Thursday night. “We’re always ready to do what we need to do. But I don’t think people need to wait on us. I think that it’s really important for us to collaborate together, and obviously being a part of More than a Vote and, of course, having initiatives through the W and through the PA. We’re going to work hard to be able to do what we can to impact our communities and ensure that people understand their civic power. But I don’t think we need to wait.” 

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And there are people within the basketball space who haven’t waited, especially the group called Hoops for Harris, a collection of basketball enthusiasts who are organizing around the vice president and her running mate, Governor Tim Walz. Former WNBA players Crystal Langhorne and Lindsey Harding appeared in an organizing video for the organization on Tuesday evening. 

So what’s the reason for the slower rollout this year for current WNBA players? Circumstances have changed. This election has been unlike any other, with a major candidate stepping into the race so late. And this time, WNBA players are dispersed around the entire country rather than all together in one place. But the differences in 2020 and 2024 don’t imply at at all that players think this election has lower stakes.

“What this election can really come down to is a pivotal moment of bodily autonomy,” Sparks guard Layshia Clarendon told The Next back on June 20, about a month before President Biden decided not to run for re-election.

“And so we understand that, we’re playing a 40 game season. We’re not in a bubble. It’s tremendously hard to organize as a team. That really was a special moment in time. So we still have commitments to social justice, but knowing it’s hard with the level of playing and traveling we do, so it really kind of is narrowing the focus on reproductive rights and voting to get people to understand the big moment.” 

July 21 was when Biden stepped down and endorsed Harris. It was also day after the WNBA All-Star game and the true beginning of the WNBA’s olympic break. The whiplash of this election cycle and the cadence of games and practices has made it more difficult for players to keep track and stay as informed as they may have preferred. 

The Liberty’s Vandersloot expressed just as much after Thursday’s game to a group of reporters—that it’s been hard to pay closer attention. But while she might not be as up to date on daily politics as she wants to be as of now, she still knows quite clearly who has her support. 

“I just think showing my support and I think as a league,” she said. “It’s a whole movement, it’s not just me wearing the shirt, we were all wearing it just to show our support for the Vice President.”

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