MLB Pulls All-Star Game From Atlanta, Georgia in Response to Voting Law

While the National Basketball Association and the N.C.A.A., which governs college sports, have often been on the forefront of pushing progressive politics — the N.B.A. moved its own all-star game out of Charlotte and the N.C.A.A. pulled championships out of the state after North Carolina Republicans enacted a “bathroom ban” on transgender people — baseball has rarely made a political statement as significant as moving its midsummer classic out of Georgia.

The Associated Press in 2017 estimated that North Carolina would have lost $3.7 billion over 12 years had it not repealed its law. Once North Carolina lawmakers repealed it, the N.B.A. awarded Charlotte the 2019 basketball all-star game.

The N.C.A.A. has declined to comment about the new Georgia voting law. The Southeastern Conference, which has 14 schools from South Carolina to Texas and plays its annual football championship game in Atlanta, has not addressed it.

Before baseball’s announcement, top Georgia Democrats had publicly opposed boycotting their state over the Republican voting law, instead urging companies to fight against it and calling on Congress to pass H.R. 1, a federal voting rights bill that could override parts of the Georgia law.

Senator Jon Ossoff, a Democrat elected in a January runoff election, said companies upset about the law should “stop any financial support to Georgia’s Republican Party.”

Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia, who faces re-election in 2022, blamed the state’s Republicans. “It is not the people of Georgia or the workers of Georgia who crafted this law, it is politicians seeking to retain power at the expense of Georgians’ voices,” he said. “Today’s decision by M.L.B. is the unfortunate consequence of these politicians’ actions.”

Many Democratic members of the state legislature have been similarly against boycotts in Georgia. “Stop with this boycott nonsense,” wrote Jen Jordan, a Democratic senator from outside of Atlanta, on Twitter last week. “I would rather people and companies use their economic power in this state for change rather than not come here at all.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/us/politics/mlb-all-star-game-moved-atlanta-georgia.html