Colin Kaepernick Says He Joined With Marxists To Edit New Book Because ‘Black Liberation Simply Isn’t Possible Under Capitalism’

In an interview with the New Republic, Colin Kaepernick defended partnering with prominent Marxists to edit a new pro-Black studies anthology because “Black liberation simply isn’t possible under capitalism.”

The former NFL quarterback, known for taking a knee before the National Anthem to protest racism in the United States, made the statement to journalist Indigo Olivier. In the interview, Kaepernick promoted the new book he helped edit called, Our History Has Always Been Contraband: In Defense of Black Studies. The book features writing by W.E.B. Du Bois, Angela Davis, and Bobby Seale, among others.

Kaepernick, along with editors Robin D.G. Kelley and Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, also penned essays for the book. Olivier pointed out that Kaepernick worked with “two of the most prominent Black Marxists in the country,” and that the book featured writers who were nearly all anti-capitalists.

“I’ve long admired Keeanga and Robin’s work as well as their uncompromising political analysis and understanding that Black liberation simply isn’t possible under capitalism,” Kaepernick said of his fellow editors. “I think the anthology makes this argument quite well, and I hope it challenges readers to see that racism is not white supremacy’s only ingredient. White supremacy persists in part because of its relationship with capitalism, heteropatriarchy, ableism, and so on.”

The book’s release comes as school systems all over the United States are banning the teaching of Critical Race Theory.

OLIVIER: You’ve described Our History Has Always Been Contraband as the type of book Governor Ron DeSantis doesn’t want you to read, and your co-editors both reference Trump’s 1776 Commission as a backlash to the 1619 Project. What are your thoughts on the GOP’s obsession with attacking Black Studies?

KAEPERNICK: Black Studies and, more generally, a critical engagement with U.S. history, threatens the white supremacist status quo. Any attempt to whitewash the past should actually be understood as a concrete step toward fascism and a desire to build a nation state where power is concentrated in the hands of a self-anointed (read: white) few. That said, I wouldn’t characterize GOP attacks on Black Studies as an “obsession” but rather as core to their white supremacist political project.

Read New Republic‘s article here.