Higher Learning with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay - Colin Kaepernick Joins Higher Learning

Episode Date: September 16, 2026

Surprise, Thought Warriors! Higher Learning is here with a pop-up episode featuring none other than Colin Kaepernick in the studio! Kaepernick drops by not just to promote his new book, 'The Perilous Fight,' but to have a real conversation with Van and Rachel about everything. From civil rights to NFL blackballing to racial identity to protesting against police brutality to Target, no topic is off-limits. (00:00) Welcome to Higher Learning(2:59) Colin Kaepernick joins us in the studio; 'The Perilous Fight' out September 15(15:52) Racial identity(26:48) NFL career(45:52) The settlement(58:02) Muddled message?(1:08:08) Growth through adversity(1:19:07) Fighting the good fight Hosts: Van Lathan and Rachel LindsayGuest: Colin KaepernickProducers: Marco Escalante and Jade WhaleySocial Producer: Bernard MooreVideo Supervision: Chris Thomas Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, I'm Thought Warriors. What is up? How I'm Learning is on, is I Van Lathen, Jr. And it's me, Rachel and Lindsay. Rachel and Lindsay. That's what I'm talking about. Tell him what else we're going to talk about. Colin Kaepernick is on the show today.

So we aren't talking about it anymore. We're having the conversation. We're having a conversation. With him. With Cap. Yeah. I'm with Cap. Cap is with us.

It is a wide-ranging conversation about an hour and a half about the life and times of Colin Kaepernick. Yeah, he's got a new book coming out. It really is, I mean, he's done a lot, but this is his memoir. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The book is called The Perilist Fight.

It is available September 15th. And it is a much different peak into his life than anything he's put out before. He's put out things that had to do with his childhood, things that had to do with the protests itself. But nothing that was all encapsuling. Yeah. And for those of you, I think this conversation is really interesting. All encompassing. A variety of reasons.

But obviously, Van and I have different relationships. with Colin Kaepernick, I don't have one. You do. And I think that it gives you a different perspective from both sides. And if you think you know everything, believe me, there's a lot that hasn't been said. And it happens in this interview and in the book. We're going to get to it

in a second, but before we do, I do want to say one thing. I want to recognize somebody that we haven't recognized in a long time and that's hootnanny. So we haven't really talked about who nanny in a while. And we haven't talked about Mountline in a while. A lot of my

animal friends and things that have been going on with them. We haven't really discussed it. But who nanny is, he's healed up, right? And he- So take it off. No. He's healed up. Why are you?

You said he's healed. Can I ask you a question? Why are you against them? That's literally, I don't like birds. But why, but he likes you. He likes you. Look how he's looking at me. He likes you.

This is who nanny and who nanny is here for us and he guards the set, which which is very important because sometimes other people will use this room. Sometimes I'll be doing the Midnight Boys and I'll see, go close on Hoot Nanny. Sometimes I'll, and I'll see him peeking over like what you want right now. What the fuck is going on? Nigger, what you're doing when is our learning coming back? Because this is when he flies. So shout out to Whoon Nanny.

Shout out to all the Isles around. Shout to owls, man. You know what I'm saying? Shout out to birds. No, come on. Come on. But we need birds in the ecology. Fine.

I guess whatever, but I don't have to like associate myself with them. Speaking of birds, eagles are birds, they are in Philadelphia. That's an NFL franchise. They should assign Colin Kaepernick. He'll talk to you about it on the other side of this break. Whole interview with Colin Kaepernate.

The perilous fight comes out September 15th. Okay. Colin Kaepernick joins us on Higher Learning. Finally. Finally. This has been a long time coming. We've wanted this to happen. First of all, incredibly happy to have you here, brother.

It does my spirit well to see you. Your book, The Periless Fight, is in stores September 15th. Yes. This audience is not going to be alien to your name, being on this podcast. We've talked frequently about things involving you, but now we get to talk to you. I feel like this book is a way for you to talk to people. Is that the reason why you wrote it? Yeah, that's part of it.

And also to try to help give guidance and some blueprint of experiences I had to navigate, what we had to go through, and ultimately what's on the other side of it. How do we collectively move forward? How do we build stronger movements? How do we build stronger communities? I think all of that becomes incredibly important.

But a lot of the lessons learned through this process show up in the book. And there are also lessons that we've seen historically show up. I think a lot of people are going to have a misconception about, and maybe I've seen some chatter around it because you've written other books, but you have not told this story before. And even the timing of the book, was that intentional that you wanted it to come out this month, 10 years later, and take a look back at what the last decade has been?

Did you always kind of plan this way? It was a little bit of coincidence process-wise. timing-wise, because it's been, we've been working on this for some years now. It landing on the 10-year or around the 10-year anniversary. Obviously, holding. Of taking a knee and protesting. I mean, there's significance there. I think also significance in relation to, oh, thank you.

The perilous fight. The perilous fight. The perilous fight. It flew into the goddamn. Oh, here. You can't cover it. Share space right there. Same colors.

Great choice, y'all. But the other part is also looking at where we're at as a society today. I think it's important that we continue to work and make that prominent because we have a lot of forces that are working counter to that right now. Let's start there. Well, before we get into some of the other topics, let's talk directly about the book. what for you was either the most important thing to share in the book to get across to people or the most difficult? There's a few different things that I think became important and we're centered around a lot

of questions that I got over the last 10 years. A good portion of that was, well, what led to the protest and what got you there? Oftentimes I heard it talked about similar to my playing career where it was like, oh, you came out of nowhere. Right. It's like, no, that's not the case. This is years in a lifetime in the making that ultimately led to that moment. The other part is, well, what were all the things that happened behind the scenes?

And why were you taking the actions you were taking? What was happening? And being able to lay some of that out as far as situations that we were trying to navigate, implications of what that was for me personally versus what I thought was best for the movement and then also a little bit of personal life and that aspect and the implications around that and how you have to navigate it. Define the movement. The movement.

So think about movement more broadly. I would position that as collectively as black folks and as a society, how are we building towards a better society? In this instance, we're specifically talking police brutality, but we're also talking systemic oppression. Systems in place. Policing as a system. Mass incarceration as a system. Our political environments and political systems.

How do we actually change those to create better outcomes for us collectively? I'll get one more. What do you feel like your protest taking a knee? was attempting to affect as far as systemic change. Awareness to systemic change, what did you see that bridge be? Yeah, so the protest became one, we have to take action in some form or fashion, to be able to get people moving, to be able to get people aware. And that was a lot of conversations that we saw going into 2016.

My end was, we know there's major issues. What are we going to do? And for me, I look at it as we may not have the perfect action. but we have to do something to move us forward. And that became a way that we can bring this to the national stage. It ultimately was able to accomplish that. And then on the back of that, we're able to see collective movements building across the country around policy change, around addressing policing, around allocating resources and dollars

to be able to solve the issues that we're seeing. So I think that became important as part of that process. You've described the book as equal parts memoir and manifesto. in Manifesto. What's the manifesto? Manifesto is how we actually move forward from here. I think the part that I think about in relation to that is, in similar, looking back to 2016, there was a lot of conversation of we know the issues, but how do we actually move forward? And this becomes a space of here's how I think we should be moving forward. And some of the insights come through the stories and narrative within, but all the things.

also more broadly, I think we have to be very clear and very definitive in our approaches as far as how we are going to affect change. Because thinking about it as far as the ends justifying the means, the means is important. How we get there is important. And we can't lose ourselves along the way as part of that. And I think that's one of the core pieces. I think it's important for me. And I want people to be able to take away from this. I love when people take control of the narrative. And you've, I mean, people think, because people talk about you and, like, develop their own narrative, but you're now telling your story. And I love that you've taken your time to do it. And then people see, like, this big moment, but as you talk about in the book,

they don't see the years that made it possible for you to be prepared for the moment. What are some one or two moments within this book or stories that you tell that made you ready for the moment that happened in 2016? There's a couple moments that immediately come to mind. One is the story that we opened the book with, where neighborhood kids tie me to a rose tree. I'm black, adopted to a white family, predominantly white community. Kids that I thought were my friends throughout the neighborhood,

ultimately did this. and in that moment and in the moments after that was the realization of oh you have to navigate this by yourself and no one is going to look out for you and protect you in this and having that awareness and being able to navigate society in that way became really important um not something that ideally you want to go through but it does build a resilience in you and a skill set to be able to allow you to move forward in a different way. Now, on the flip side of that, thinking about this later in my life, being with my partner Nessa,

her giving me the autobiography of Malcolm X was another major turning point. And it wasn't just the autobiography itself. It's what it opened the door to. And it really was questioning everything that I was taught growing up, questioning all of the narratives that have been told. Like Malcolm, the Panthers were demonized in the community where I came from. So for me, it opened the door to, one, validating and giving context of experiences I had growing up, but also opening the door to a larger conversation of what are all of the

other pieces of literature and insight that I should be gathering and learning from that will help broaden my perspective and also better understand how to be able to move forward. The power of a woman. I was about to ask. Did you feel like you truly knew yourself before you met Nessa? Yes. I feel like I knew myself. But the part that I didn't have is the broader context to be able to put that within.

Right. So I get a lot of questions and this is always interesting to me. Being black adopted to a white family growing up predominantly white community is always like, well, when did you know you were black? And it's like from the earliest day as possible. Because even if you didn't want to acknowledge it, everybody's going to tell you. So like that's not, that wasn't a thing for me. It was more so how do I navigate society as part of that.

So that part, I knew myself or I felt like I knew myself. What I didn't have is the broader structural insights, the broader political. insights to be able to put it in that context and be able to say, oh, these actually aren't one-off moments or one-off situations. There's actually a whole history and lineage that has built to this moment. And that became really important for me to be able to understand society better, be able to understand black struggle better, and then be able to think about how do we collectively move forward from that.

At that same time, at your younger age, you're also becoming a, sports star. So you start playing football and baseball at like what age? Organized football at eight years old. Eight years old. Yeah. So then once you start to excel in that, is there ever in your mind a confusion of why people love you? Like, and what I'm saying is that like I know athletes from Baton Rouge where we are harvested, right? And they don't realize that it's their 40 time that people love and not them, that it's their arm strength that people love and not them. You're becoming, you're a part of the community.

Did it ever feel like, looking back on it now, that you were actually less accepted than you felt like you were as Colin and more as the quarterback? Really interesting. One of the things that my parents did, and I don't know if they intentionally knew they were doing this are setting me up for this, is they always talk to me about football being something you're passionate about, but not who I was. And laying that foundation and making that a distinction

that everybody has their skill sets that they're good at, whether that's football, whether that's science, whether that's as a musician, as a teacher, a doctor, whatever that is. But that doesn't define who you are. That's part of what you do. and for me that gave me a good sense of yeah people can love me for going out and scoring a touchdown and helping a team win the game but how they treat me outside of that also becomes an indicator of where I actually fit within this larger picture and I got to see this in really interesting ways in part because my parents were white I got to see how people interacted with me as an individual and I got to see how they interacted with me

once my parents walked in the room. So I also got to see a lot of the racism in a lot more blatant ways than I think people normally do because I got to see it play out in real time. So that gave me a good awareness of how people engage when it came to sports, how they engaged when it came to me individually, how they engaged when it came to me and my parents

being in the same room. I want to go back We have We have biracial Conversations here Podcasts You know we're going to So you know

You know what's coming But you talk about this in the book And like I'm wondering What was it like Forming a sense of racial identity Because it's not just that You're biracial It's that

And I hope I'm saying that right Because do you identify as biracial Or just black? I just identify as black Okay Because that's a conversation We have Just black to me

Okay, everybody? I know about whatever people want to say. Whatever you want to say. When you walk out in the world, you're going to get treated as black. You're going to tell you all. It's whatever you want to say. It's my thing. I'm not going to tell you.

I'm not going to tell you either. Shout out to y'all. But to me, you're just black to me. But I want to talk what that was like because you were, as you've already stated, adopted by white parents. And so what was it like, and living in a white, majority white community? So what was it like forming your sense of racial identity? and what was it like having conversations with your parents about race?

And did you have those conversations? Because I don't want to give too much about the book, but I know that when everything kind of came to a head, there were some difficult moments with your family. Yeah. I mean, it was, it's interesting to navigate it because I think you really end up, I think there's two potential pathways that become very distinct.

you either own your blackness and that's just who you are and that's what it is or you go all the way to assimilate. Yeah. Like I really don't see a lot of middle ground happen within that.

And for me it was never a question of like oh, do I become something other than myself? Like blackness and being myself was just that's what it was. And you're, again, you're constantly reminded of this too.

Like, you know it whether you like it or not. It is imposed upon you. And I think that, navigating that from a young age also gives you a resilience of as you're being pushed to assimilate and you figure out how to navigate that. It also better prepares you for when the rest of the world tells you to assimilate.

And, I mean, that shows up. up, as you mentioned, when the protest happens in 2016, my parents had a very different response than, I would say, I initially thought would have came out of that. But I also realize that they do not have the same lived experiences as me. They do not have the same context. They have not been treated the same way. And while I would hope there's a stronger level of understanding in that moment, like that there's just a significant difference there from perspectives and how we view things. As far as the conversations growing up, my parents were always very clear that I was a young black boy. They gave me a sense of where they thought I was from in Africa

to the best of their knowledge. It's in the book. But there's also the reality of how you dress, how I have my hair, what I'm listening to, who my friends are, that all become things that are part of the question of, well, this isn't how we've done things, and this isn't what we think is best. And there's a lot of friction that comes along with that that you have to navigate. In the last 10 years, how has that, has their, I guess, perception or their mentality changed with everything that you've been through the last 10 years? Because I could understand how they have those conversations about you and you're their son and it's particular to you.

But then in the grand scheme of things, there might not be the same understanding because there's not the same connection or lived experience. So in the last 10 years with everything that you've gone through, now having your own child too, has their perception changed? or their perspective, I should say, change? I believe it has, based upon some of the conversations that we've had. And it's, I mean, it's something that you're constantly navigating. Like, to me, there's an awareness around it. And I'm conscious of that. Like, that's going to be something that I'm always going to be navigating.

It's also something that now being a father, seeing in that seat, is, preparing my daughter to be able to navigate that, which is interesting to think about as her being four years old now. But it is something that you have a significant awareness around. But to your question, I do think perceptions have changed there. I hope they continue to grow and involved. Being that you have to have those conversations with your parents, how do you feel about the broader notion of having those conversations in society? A lot of times we get side. We talk about who we should be talking to, how we should be talking to them, whether or not those conversations are useful with people that we either disagree with or people who hold opinions that are like at cross purposes with our humanity. Do you believe that we should engage in those conversations across the aisle with your neighbors or whatever being that you've had to have them sometimes within your own family group?

Yeah. I think it's important to have those conversations when they're being done in good faith. I mean, we've seen plenty of conversations where it's not done in good faith. You're not actually trying to get to a place of understanding. It's just more to have the argument or the debate. That I don't find particularly useful. But what's been interesting for me over the last 10 years is the number of people from places that I did not expect coming up and being like, you know what, originally I have. hated you. I did not like you. And I was wrong. And that has surprised me because it's shown up a lot in southern states. Like people just did not have a, they didn't have an understanding.

They were fed information. It took conversations within the community. It took them seeing actions over the course of years to then get to a space to be like, you know what, what you told me is actually not what's happening here. And I think that's important. I do think it takes a, it takes time, takes a level of patience as far of that process. People may not get as quickly as we want them to. But I think it's important to have those conversations. I would also say in doing so, we have to continuously push forward and push the bounds of

what we can accomplish while we're trying to get some people up to speak. in relation to their perspective. Last thing on this, how do you know when the conversation is in good faith? That's a really good question. Tough to decipher. But normally you can tell by how people approach the conversation. Normally they approach it with a curiosity or they approach it with, hey, I'm trying to understand this. Or I'm trying to get to this place.

We're trying to accomplish this goal together. Can you tell me more about this? Those are normally the conversations that I see happen in good faith. The ones that are immediately combative and defensive, typically are the ones that I don't see happening in good faith. But I would say tough to decipher, and typically depending on who it is, if they have a background or track record,

you can get a little bit of insight from that as well. Last question for me about your childhood, and I love that you talked about the consistency, because we're going to get to that later on in the conversation as we've seen people kind of go back and forth with everything. But I'm just wondering, just like looking back now, is there anything you understand about your childhood because you're a father now that maybe has, like, helped you in a certain way? I think the things that I take away from my childhood that stood out most of me, one is, you. one is the moral foundation that I think my parents laid was crucial for me now they laid that without the racial context right but it gave me a strong foundation to be able to operate from we need to treat everybody with respect we need to treat everybody equally it doesn't matter what

position you hold or what socioeconomic economic status you have, like, that shouldn't change how I engage with you. That became a strong foundation for me to be able to move forward from. The other part was looking back, knowing the things that I had to navigate is also making sure that my daughter feels comfortable being able to come to us at any point in time and be able to say, I'm actually trying to get through this. I'm trying to figure this out. I want to be the first call that she makes

and how do I lay the foundation where she trusts me with those conversations so we can help her navigate it. The other part that I think about is within that also creating space where she has to be independent and has to be able to navigate things

and go out and fail. And there's spaces growing up that I knew I was navigating things by myself I had to go fail at some of them I had to figure it out, learn the lessons

you carry some of the scar tissue with you but that allows you to understand how to handle it the next time and actually how to be able to learn and grow and I think if you're coddled and those situations are avoided you actually miss

opportunities to grow and develop in a way that is really beneficial. So trying to find those moments and balance within that as well. We're going to get into a little bit of the football stuff here as far as it relates to your NFL career. Because in the book and what that meant, in the book, you get deep into not just football on the field,

what it meant to be a teammate, what it meant to be the quarterback, even some stuff with what it means to be a business thing, like how agents talk around you and talk to people and not to you. All that's in the book. I want to pick up on something you said earlier, though. You said that your parents were able to establish inside of you

that football was not your identity. However, throughout your struggle with the NFL, it seemed like a large portion of who you were, maybe not who you were, but you really, really wanted to run back out on that field. So how do you square those two things? What was it about returning to the NFL if it wasn't your entire identity

that animated you so much. Well, I don't think your career should be able to be taken away from you because you want a better future for people. I agree. Plain and simple. To me, it brings up larger labor conversations along with the political ones.

But for me, I spent 20 plus years in my life. building to a career that had gone out and became one of the best of the world at. And because I went out and took a position to try to just foundationally have police stop killing black people, it was like, you don't get to play anymore. And are we okay with that as a society? And for me, it's not just about going out and chasing a passion and being back on the floor. football field. It's also what message is being sent to us collectively as a community.

If that happens and I pack it up and I quit and I'm like, oh, you know what, y'all? They got us. It happened again. What is the ripple effect of that? What message does that send to the next person that wants to fight for our community? That's a message I'm not okay with and I'll fight against every day I have. The other part I think about in relation to it is if the NFL is truly a meritocracy

and if you are truly who you claim to be, then there's no reason I shouldn't be on the field. Pete Carroll has said publicly I'm a starter. John Harbaugh wanted to bring me in. Other coaches, other GMs have said the same.

So it's never been about my ability to be able to play football is been about the political position of creating a better future for black folks and for society more broadly and I think it also speaks to collective power that players have and the realization of that power is a threat to NFL owners in the institution but more broadly stepping on the field I think you should be able to pursue your dreams and your passions and also making sure that you're laying the foundation for other people to be able to do that as well. So this is the thing I've talked about on the podcast, and I don't know if you've heard it or not.

So I'm just, I'm so excited to get to ask you this question. Yeah. I have, and you just laid that out beautifully, and I totally understand it. What I've been questioning and maybe some of the listeners too is an understanding of why you'd want to be a part of this league that you've rightfully called out, brought to the attention of fans and maybe non-fans of just what the NFL is about, obviously the collusion, the way that they treat black players, the way that there's this facade of, oh, we're about this,

but in reality, not necessarily because of what happened to you. And we see that later with the way that they approached George Floyd, and you talk about that in your book as well. So my question has always been a lack of understanding, of why you would even want to play again in a league. How could you trust the players? I mean, not players. How could you trust the owners?

How could you trust the system? How could you trust just the league in general? Yes, I would love for you to answer the question. Yeah. To me, I think of it pretty simply. I think of it similar to the context that we put the conversation of the U.S. and what I heard from a lot of right-wing and MAGA folks, which is, well, if you're going to critique America, why don't you leave?

Why do you want to be a part of it? And the conversation around the NFL has largely been the same. If you're going to critique the NFL, if you're going to say it's racist, if you're going to say you don't trust the owners, well, why don't you leave? I don't think we should be in a space where we run from those fights. Otherwise, we just allow it to continue to exist as it is. and I don't trust the owners. I think that's very clear at this point.

I don't trust Roger Goodell, but they're the ones that are running the organizations. I reserve the right to be able to critique them and call them out for the things that they're doing while also trying to pursue a career that I've been able to build over 20 plus years. I think both of those things can exist. I don't have to like everything that happens within an organization to be able to be a part of it and also try to help move it forward.

I think similarly where we have plenty of critiques of the U.S., we're going to call out the injustices that we see, but we're still a part of it. So I look at those as very similar situations. So is it more symbolic for you to be able to play or keep trying to want to play, or is it really about the game and the love and you wanting to play? And then I guess the second part of that is what does it, I guess, like, and I guess we all do this being a part of corporations in America, which is what you kind of said. But are you subjecting yourself? Because you've called out the NFL as being, you know, like it's a form of slavery. I'm paraphrasing, but, you know, you said that before. What does it mean to subject yourself to that again?

Yeah. So the areas that we've called out specifically within the NFL were the combine and comparing that. to slave auction blocks. A lot of parallels similarities within that. I'm also not the first person to be able to call that out. I mean, Bill Rodin has a whole book, $40 million slaves. You can't watch it. You can't watch the combine and not be.

It's just, it's just. For sure. Absolutely. So I'll also say, just looking historically, Kurt Flood talked about this when he was fighting for a free agency for players because previously players were not able to switch teams. Once you were drafted, you were with that team forever. They owned your rights forever. And the critique was very similar. Hey, you're well paid. You're in a good position. Why are you comparing the institution to slavery? And his response was something along lines of

a well-paid slave is still a slave nonetheless. So I think that's one piece of it. On the part of wanting to play, I think this has been one of the more nefarious, narratives out there that has been intentionally planted. Do you actually want to play football still? I wouldn't wake up at 4.30 every day and train if I didn't want to play. When the NFL put together their workout in 2019, I wouldn't have been ready to go out there and perform at the level I did if I didn't want to play. When I was able to get a workout with the Raiders in 2022,

I wouldn't have been able to go out there and perform the way I did if I didn't want to play. So it's not something that's performative. It's not something that's symbolic. It's something that I've prepared for and continue to prepare for for the last 10 years. And I think that's important to clarify. The other part that I think is important to clarify is people have also, I've seen this narrative out there of, oh, well, you've been offered different roles in different positions that is demonstrably false. I've never been offered a position of any sort within the

NFL to play quarterback. So now as a starter, now as a backup, now as a third stringer, now as a practice squad player. And we have opened the door to all of those just to be able to prove, yeah, I'll take any position because once you step on the field, players know, fans know, who can play and who can. And we've made that very clear, but that's also been a narrative that's been put out there consistently is, oh, you've had offers you've rejected

and also, well, you want a specific position or you don't actually want to play. All of those are false. What are the other things that have been said about you? I mean, I don't want you to give away everything that's important because there's things in the book. At this point, what hasn't been said? Right.

No, the book does have a lot that hasn't been said, to be very honest with you. I mean, there's a lot. Because I really want people to read it. Yeah. You know. I'm not going to get into the whole, like, frustration, like, aspect of this, of, like, people saying things that you know aren't true, but, like,

whatever. But I covered the story. Actually, it's important for me to say that I covered the story, like, while it was happening in real time. And so in covering the story, and I know that, like, other people, like, Howard Bryan and a lot of people, they feel like people misremember things. And it's not fair sometimes for, like, us to be like, oh, you guys don't know what you. like when you were, it was part of your job to like cover the actual story.

Yeah. But having said that, what are some of the more insidious mistruths that you feel like exist beyond the whole Colin Kaepernick doesn't want to play narrative? Is there another one that continuously gets repeated that jumps out at you as, that's not true and it impugns my character? There's a few different ones. One that was a little bit laughable early on was like, oh, well, you can't play because he's vegan.

You lost some weight, though. I lost some weight because I had three surgeries. Right. So I had a labrum surgery. I had a left shoulder. I had a UCL surgery on my right thumb. I have a meniscus scope going into the 2016 season. So you lose weight.

You have muscle atrophy on the back of it. Also having three separate surgeries. I couldn't really train anything. I was just rehabbing everything. So that was one component of it. The other that I think is, and John Lynch from the GM for the 49ers now, actually later came out and apologized for this. After the 2016 season, Kyle Shanhan, John Lynch came into the 49ers organization.

There were new hires. And they said, we're going to cut you. We're going in a different direction with the offense. which the validity of that will put to the side for this conversation. We'll accept that at face value. But they said they were going to cut me. And like, we're either going to cut you after the league year starts before your contract is guaranteed for the following year. Or you can opt out now.

Now, two factors of this. One, I opt out of my contract to be able to give my contract. to be able to give myself the best opportunity to go out and get another job with a team. So I could be able to do that before free agency started, before other teams found quarterbacks to be able to fill their roles.

So I wanted to give myself the best opportunity there. I also realized they were doing that so they didn't have to make that decision and have that be part of their narrative of, oh, we cut him. Which is to each their own. Right. But John Lynch later came out and apologized for not clarifying that, that they were going to cut me anyways.

And that became a different narrative of, oh, I didn't want to play for the 49ers. Ties into some of the larger narrative of, oh, you didn't want to play. Another one that was out there pretty significantly was, oh, you're bad for business. That's why we're not going to bring you to a team. and that was just proven false. After the protest, my jersey went to number one. Not something that I thought about or was prepared for, but just speaks to the reality of how fans and consumers of football were responding.

We also saw this with the Dream Crazy campaign with Nike. They did the campaign, had direct support for me, as well as other athletes that were trying to do work in the community. community and their valuation jumped by $6 billion. So I think in relation to the Bavre Business conversation, that was also very disingenuous. Those are just a couple. There's a litany of others within there. So what was it that made the owners collude against you?

So it had to be, if it wasn't financial, then it was cultural and political. Yes. And power, tying to the political. Say more. So the part that I think people need to understand is the NFL is approximately 70% black. Within the NFL, players do not have guaranteed contracts. But if players organized, they would have guaranteed contracts one weekend of football. Also, players collectively realizing their power being 70% of the organization.

organization, the influence and control they could have over any outcome that they actually wanted, there's nothing the owners could really do. You are the product for the owners. Without you, they don't have anything. So whether it is, hey, we're going to make you do things to be able to address police brutality. We want to do things to be able to address mass incarceration. We want guaranteed contracts. we want better health benefits.

We want you to show up in any number of ways. The players have control and the power to be able to do that. They haven't realized it to this point. And I think that became the threat of if players understand that and they understand the influence they have, well, then what does that mean for us in our ability to be able to control the bottom line and be able to control the organization and business

in the way that we want? So then what is the NFLPA doing? Not much. Yeah. Like somebody's listening like, well, isn't there an NFLPA that's like run by the players and it's all supposed to be this, we come together and we demand things, you know, that are for our betterment. What is the purpose? From my experience and what I've seen, the NFLPA largely becomes a feeder system into the NFL. It is a stepping stone there.

So much so, the NFLPA, who is supposed to be protecting the players, I've had multiple engagements with them, one around my surgeries because I was lied to about my surgeries. By who? By the 49ers. Okay. Was told my three surgeries were contusions. Went out, got MRIs, got a second opinion. I had tears in all three of them.

NFLPA was like, no, there's nothing we can do for you. When I was being blackballed by the NFL, I went out and hired outside representation because of my understanding of the NFLPA. The NFLPA's position initially was, oh, we don't think there's actually collusion here, so like there's not much we can do for you. as we went through a litigation process, and they saw the discovery that we got, they saw the depositions that we were getting, then it became, oh, well, we want to be a part of it. So if things turn out well, we can claim victory. We asked them to be able to come back to us with a plan to be able to support.

They said, oh, we'll have that to you in the next 24 hours. We still have not received that plan to this day. From the NFLPA. From the NFLPA. So I'll get the NFLPA is not effective in any means. I'll also tie this specifically to my brother Eric Reed and some of the work that he did. During 2020, the NFL tried to push through a new collective bargaining agreement. As part of that agreement, they were stripping retired players of their health benefits.

if not for Eric Reed going out and bringing this issue to light within the CBA or within the NFLPA and going out and interviewing family members of players that were supporting and taking care of those players and fighting to get that put back into the CBA, those players would have lost their health benefits. But the NFLPA didn't bat an eye at it until Eric brought it to the forefront. So when I think about protecting players and their role, I view them as largely ineffective.

So are they a weak union? Is the NFLPA a weak union or a fake union? I would say it, at best it's a weak union. At worst, it's a fake or co-opted union. New from Nespresso. Blend wellness into your coffee routine with a coffee plus race. range, infused with functional benefits. Choose the coffee you love with added B vitamins, like coffee plus B12 to help support immune

function and coffee plus B6 to keep your day moving. Or go with the flow and choose ginseng delight. Our new double espresso with ginseng extract. Whatever lies ahead, don't change your morning. Let your morning change you. Discover coffee plus on espresso.com. Let's come back to the settlement real quick because that's another thing that people bring up a lot. So you talked about the

way the players could organize their powers and change stuff. I remember being on TMZ when the settlement was released because I thought the settlement was that instrument. I thought, or the collusion case, I thought that was that instrument. I thought the collusion case was, okay, you prove collusion,

you break the CBA, put everything back to zero, and then the players now have this strong position by which to move the NFL around. And so when because I'm on TMZ and I'm going hard. It's cap, cap, cap, cap, cap, cap, cap.

And then when this happens, like, they go, cap shut up with the NFL and Harvey goes, Van? And I'm like, yo, what? And so I have to go on there and be like, yo, man, I don't agree with this in the whole nine. For people who still feel that way. Yeah.

And there are still people who feel that way because there are still narratives being pushed and we're not mentioning certain names in this entire interview. but I'm just I'm not even fucking feel like it dog I mean you can't if you want like you know you you can't if that's on like but I'm not I don't even fucking feel like it but for people that either have that misconception then or going to hear what you just said about the power there will be people that listen to this

and go well you had the power to destroy the CBA and bring the NFL to its knees by continuing with that case seeing it all the way through and then getting it. a favorable verdict or judgment from the judge or the legal system. Explain that to people as far as what's said about the case and the settlement and what really happened. Yeah. So I would say going through the litigation process was a learning process for me as well. Going into it, I didn't think we would be able to dismantle the CBA as part of it. but I did think all of the documentation

would be able to be exposed and revealed. Okay, so you thought that there would be, you thought for sure that these depositions would come out and all of this stuff. The depositions, the discovery, all of this stuff. Which I was like, just released that to everyone. Yeah. And like, it's a rap for y'all.

Mm. The part that I didn't understand going in to the grievance process was within the collective bargaining agreement, as soon as you file a grievance, which is the legal process you go through, that's essentially litigation under the CBA. As soon as you file a grievance, everything is bound by the CBA rules within that already. You have to go to arbitration and you go to their special arbitrator. Everything is confidential from the start. So when you sign your employment contract, there's confidentiality.

When you go to the grievance process, there's confidentiality. And all of that is laid out in advance before I ever filed anything. I now fully understand that process going in because I thought we would be able to expose more. Now, through that process, we had a lot of successes that ultimately led to the settlement. But there are also a few factors that played out that made us not continue to, to move forward. Part of that is the structure of the grievance process. So you have a special arbitrator. I think you might have a slightly different name than that, but especially a special arbitrator that's agreed upon between the NFL and NFLPA. At any point in time, the NFL can

terminate them, though. So if they make a decision that's not favorable, they don't get their paycheck anymore and they're out. So the incentive is already laid for them to be favorable to the NFL to maintain their own position. If you clear that hurdle and you have success there, you then go to a three-person special arbitration. That's the secondary level of this. Same rules for those arbitrators. So you have to go through that process. Now, the other part is in this, we thought about going the federal route. And can we try to pull this out of the jurisdiction of the CBA? On the legal side, that turns into years-long battle around jurisdiction.

The lawyer's recommendations were, if we do that, they're going to send it back to arbitration, go through arbitration. You can try to bring it back out, but that's really not an effective path. And then the last part is during this time, time period, if we look at, I believe, deflategate ultimately went up to the Supreme Court with Tom Brady. When we're looking at potential pathways like that, this is also the moment that Kavanaugh gets put on the Supreme Court, Gorsuch gets put on the Supreme Court.

So we now have a Trump-loaded or Republican-loaded Supreme Court. That's 6-3. Those two appointees were also backed by Michael Bidwell in Arizona. one of the owners and John Elway in Denver. So when you think about the alignment of Trump, the justices, and the NFL owners in NFL as an organization,

it was like, well, that landscape is already set up for us to fail. And for us, the opportunity is, if we go out there and we have a Supreme Court that actually isn't going to approach things in good faith, make a decision because it's loaded one way and backed one way. If that isn't successful, then what's on the other side of that?

A legitimacy for the NFL to be able to take this approach forever, for them to be able to push the bounds further in relation to how they can attack players, how they can try to restrict what they can do, how they can approach litigation. And that ultimately led us to a space of, well, here. here's the pathway on within the CBA for us to be able to execute. Settlement is typically going to be the outcome as part of that. And that's typically how the process plays out. But there are a lot of factors within that and also a lot of learning on my end in relation

to what you can and can't do within the process and what you can and can't expose. Did you anticipate how the announcement of the settlement would be weaponized against you? No. I didn't think it would be positioned the way that it was on the other side of it. I also will say I have empathy, a level of understanding because I went into the process with a different understanding of what could come out the other side. So without going through the process, I would have been sitting in the same seat of like, oh, man, I thought there could be more from this.

Now, I also want to say Eric Reed had separately filed a grievance had won that grievance but basically there was within the arbitration process they effectively ruled like

yeah they did it but like there's nothing we can really do to hold them accountable which was a weird insight to be able to see come from that. And Eric can speak more specifically to the details around it, but that was also something that was happening during this. So we got to see the inner workings of how things actually play out in practice versus in theory, which just made it a lot tougher landscape to be able to navigate.

But I have a lot of empathy for people in that process of, of, oh, I thought there's going to be more to be able to come from it. Well, I also say that doesn't restrict my ability to go out and pursue my career still. That doesn't restrict my ability to critique or talk about the NFL. And I think those were important distinctions for us as part of that process as well. Yeah, I mean, I'm not going to even get into the whole, oh, you know, you won a settlement. why do you want to play? Because you know, you already shut me up about that one.

But and rightfully so, no, no, no. We're just having a conversation. We're just having a conversation. I've been dying to ask you the question. I love the response from it. It makes all the sense in the world. But at the end of the day, you did prove that there was collusion. So, like, there is a benefit of it of, no, we don't get the details.

No, we don't know how specifically they did it. But at the end of the day, you did something where you were able to show that they all came together and blackballed you from being able to play. Like they worked together. That was a huge deal. So it did prove something, and I understand the legality of it and why you made the decisions that you did. I'm really glad that you laid that out.

But I love the latter part of what you said, because that's something that's come up again, and this is also a part of you controlling the narrative and speaking out. There were roadblocks set up against you before where you were never going to be able to disclose certain things. and the term NDA has been thrown out here. And NDA non-disclosure agreement versus non-disperaging agreement, two totally different things, which I from an outside laid out on this podcast, but you being directly impacted by it, you get it.

You've already explained to us that you were never going to be able to disclose certain things because of the agreement that had been negotiated before you. But you were able to maintain the fact that you could continue to try to play. and you could speak out in ways however you wanted to. Can you speak a little bit more on that because there have been other people that are speaking, trying to do that for you? Yeah.

Just to make very clear in this, with a non-disclosure agreement means the information that's part of that process can't be made public without both parties agreeing to it. That was laid as part of the CBA before we entered the agreement. process. That also, they include that language as part of the settlement.

Like that is standard practice. It doesn't change. It didn't change anything. It's just a reiteration of what it was already at play. Non-disparagement becomes, hey, not only is this information not able to be disclosed, but you can't speak about us in any form or fashion that is negative. I can speak about the NFL however I please. You didn't sign that.

There is no non-disparagement agreement. I can say what I want about the NFL. You've probably seen some of that today already. But there's nothing that restricts me in relation to how I want to talk about the NFL, how I want to talk about positions that they've taken, about them blackballing me, about them targeting other players. They have no control there. Did they try to get you to sign a non-disperaging agreement?

Yes. And you refused. I refused. And then disparaged the league. I saw it. We covered it. It's just like, people forget.

Yeah, I get it. I mean, people forget. Also, people become disingenuous because they have their own motives. Also, people get confused over what an NDA is. Right, right. We'll live in good faith, and I'll try not to be. completely. Let me ask you

this though. Do you feel like at some point the message of police brutality and systemic change was overshadowed by your beef with the NFL? Do you ever feel like it went from we're talking about police brutality because

we should say that in the book, the perilous fight which is out on September 15th there is a direct corollary made between the case of Mario Woods and how that affected you, how so many of the things that we were seeing,

so many of the marches that we were seeing, the videos and the cases surrounding black people being brutalized by the police, at the same time, really, that you were having a personal and intellectual and societal awakening about your place in culture and what you could do, that all of these things came together

where you're like, I have to do something, right? And then you do that thing and it turns into something that maybe you didn't even anticipate. Throughout there, though, there's been a criticism that it became less about police brutality and systemic change and more about your fight with the NFL. You say what to that? I understand the perspective on it because I think multiple fights and battles ended up happening at the same time. first the protest being focused on systemic oppression specifically police brutality

that is what we were calling out now there was a number of deflection tactics to try to reframe the conversation divert it make it about the military or the love of the U.S. or First Amendment rights all of these other conversations to try to distract from police brutality. So that's one part of it. The second part is within the protest, the NFL then targeting me

and taking my career away became a second fight of are we going to allow this to happen? And what are we going to do about it? Who's the we? We collectively as society and I think specifically as black folks. Okay.

I would say for me personally, like that was something I was going to fight against as well. Now, both of those are happening at the same time. We're also seeing the alignment of the NFL with the Trump administration. They're raising millions of dollars for him. Robert Kraft is flying on Air Force One. He's on the phone with Jerry Jones saying this is a winning issue for me. Like, they're organizing.

So we're seeing that happen within the broader political speech. Donald Trump calls us out specifically at one of his rallies. Get those SOBs off the field. You're fired. And ultimately, being blackballed on the tail end of that. So, fighting for police brutality led to my blackballing. Against. You weren't fighting for it.

Fighting against police. I'm about like, yeah, what I say again? Like, yeah, whip these niggas asses. No. No. No. Oh, no. We wouldn't be here today.

We would have you whipped these motherfuckers asses. I'm Colin Kaepernick, and I got a message for a cruise. You're not going hard enough in the community. Put a boot. Like, no, I'm just fucking wrong. Fight against police brutality. Ultimately led to my blackballing. And those did run in parallel, and there were people that were advocating,

one to be able to address police. least brutality, but two, to be able to get me back in the NFL. Now, there was also, as part of that, for me personally, it was very difficult to be able to say, hey, everybody should boycott the NFL because I lost my job. I wanted everybody to do that, but that's different than, hey, we need to address police brutality. One is, while I do think it falls in a larger political sphere of how we move collectively, that was a harder space for me to say, hey, I need everybody to do this,

even though I felt that way. So I tried to remain focused on we need to address police brutality. We need to create systemic change. We need to be doing the work directly in communities. You never explicitly asked for a boycott of the NFL. No. No. Because I knew that blurred the lines.

Like that, that became a space then it. I knew the conversation then shifts to, well, is this actually about police brutality? Or is this just about your own personal gain? And that's a space that is a very fine line to be able to walk. and I didn't want to cross that boundary because I didn't want to create a fog there to be able to say like,

is this actually the issue you're trying to address or is this about you? It's such, it's so not interesting. It's just the realization of how we as black people have to navigate this world. You had to consider both sides of it because of the narrative, which eventually was,

would be turned against you. Even, and I don't want to ask this as a question because I want people to read this in the book, but even the way you handled the Nate Boy, situation. I remember when all that happened. I went to Texas. He's a longhorn. I remember the media, the way it was discussed, and then like hearing you actually speak about it now, it's like, wow, you sat on that for so long. Why did you do it? Very similar to what you're talking about now. You know that the narrative can be, and you've seen it, changed against you or people will

look at this rather than focus on what it is that you're actually saying, which honestly goes back to how you were raised and what was laid down as your foundation because you had to think about not put yourself at the center of it. You had to think of something bigger than you. Something that was talked about too and timing is it's crazy because I also wonder this happened 2016. Obviously you were used within it was an election year. What happened with you and what you did was used through all of that and to see where we are 10 years now I actually think people would have responded differently, or at least I like to hope they would have, seeing what has happened over the last 10 years. How do you reconcile not voting with and your fight against police brutality,

your fight for social justice? How do you reconcile not voting with where we are now and everything that has happened? Yeah, I appreciate you asking this question. Any votes now? I was just say That's another area of growth and development. I mean, at that point in time, I was one of the millions of Americans that, like, I haven't seen this system represent us. I haven't seen things change effectively to the place that we want them to go. And it doesn't seem like anyone is willing to do anything about it within the political sphere. So why am I supporting people who aren't doing the work that actually is going to benefit us collectively? And I think on the other side of that is a realization of one, I don't think we had seen a candidate like Donald that's willing to maliciously and intentionally be able to target communities.

But also just throw the rule of law and process and any type of decorum around how we. engage out the window. The other part that became incredibly important for me is also understanding the influence that they have around federal judges, the influence that they have more broadly beyond just their position as president, and then also everything that sits down ballot of that and the implications of it. So for me, it was having a growing and developing a broader political understanding and the implications around that that ultimately led to a space of this person may not be my person and I may not agree with the majority of what they're doing but it is it is better than this other person who may work more directly against us and while I don't like it and I don't

like us that that's positioned is you know this is the only solution it has to be one of the tools that we use to try to effectively Oh, there you go. Could you say that again? It's crazy. Yeah, right? Right. Siri's getting involved here. But I think we have to view that as a tool amongst many

others that we use to be able to effectively create change. And I think realizing the impact of how that shows up and the generational impact that can be had there has led me to a space of, yeah, we need to participate within voting. We need to be very selective in who we are supporting,

but we also have to aggressively push them to the actual outcomes that we want to create. Like, I do this for myself all the time, and I'm going to ask you if you do it, like specifically on this voting. Do you ever look at something and be like, I didn't know what the fuck I was talking about? Like, do you feel like that about the voting thing? Because I read that in the book and I actually forgot about that. And the reason why I said that crass is because as you're developing your worldview, there had to be times where you went, you know what?

I have more information. I look at this differently. I'm going throughout this conversation, we've already talked about the fact that even going into the, we don't think, 28-year-old, all of this stuff is happening at the same time. You're learning all of this. You're being put in these positions. Like, this is new ground. Do you look back on things like that and go, there are some things to where my framework is pure,

my intention is pure, but maybe the substance of what I thought wasn't quite the way that I thought that it was? Absolutely. Right. Like that? And I would say if I didn't have moments like that, I would look back and be like,

what have you been doing? Right. You haven't grown, developed, evolved, in any way, like, that would be a shame if I still held the exact same perspective and hadn't grown or developed in any way. The volume one was bad. Like, it's not great.

You know what's funny? You know how I look back when Hillary Clinton was announced as the candidate? Like, I posted this thing like, oh, my God, your turn, Hillary, let's go. I would never post something like that. So, like, just... We went opposite answers.

Well, what I'm saying is I would still probably vote the way I would vote for that candidate, but there would be so much conversation around what that vote means, what I think it means, what somebody's past means, like, all kinds of different shit. I'm in a different place as well, so I sometimes look back at things that I saw and feel that same way. But I just go straight up, I'm going to be honest with y'all. I didn't know the shit that I was on at that point. I had no idea what I was talking about. Yeah.

Yeah. And you get more insight. You get more information. I think the other part that, as much as I don't like it, I've realized in the process, is you don't really find perfect solutions. Yeah. You find ways that are able to be able to move forward and hopefully you're able to create big jumps forward. but if you approach it from a space of this is going to be a holistic perfect solution like it's very difficult to find spaces like that I want to ask you this question why it's fresh

in my mind the thing that sometimes gets me when people are talking about me I'll just put myself in the middle of it for a second I hate to make myself I don't like to talk about me it's tough no you're center stage now right so The thing that bothers me is not when people think that I'm wrong. I don't care about people thinking that I'm wrong. Like, I am wrong sometimes. I'm emotional. I'm reactive sometimes.

But it bothers me when people think that I am insincere. That I don't mean what I'm saying. That I don't actually believe the wrong thing. Because it takes me away from being someone that can be corrected to someone that has to be defeated. and I do not want to live in that kind of situation with community. There are some people that thought Colin Kaepernick was wrong, but then there are other people that thought Colin Kaepernick was insincere. How do you feel when people lob those things?

Not that when they disagree, but when they think you are the grifter or the controlled opposition or like whatever. Being with everything that's happening that you've gone. through. I mean, the first part just to your point of being insincere or people being like, oh, you're grifting. If I'm grifting, I'm the worst grifter in history.

I mean, I'm losing 150 plus million on the NFL side. That's not a winning business move. Right. If that's the motivation. Like, if the goal was money, I would have said nothing. Like just period I would have said nothing I will continue playing

Continue getting my check And how many of those conversations Have we had around athletes as well Why aren't they saying something Why don't they do something I think part of it for me reflecting back Is also well If you want athletes to say something

Are you actually going to support them when they do it Like That is part of the broader conversation. Now, to being insincere or the conversation of people thinking that my, my actions are insincere, what I'm trying to do is insincere. I mean, I don't know if I can change the perspective. What I can do is lay out why I have done things. The actions that I've taken is part of that. To your point, Mario Woods was a major turning point for me. Seeing Alton Sterling and Philando Castile killed, major turning points.

Being able to go out and create Know Your Rights Camp to have direct impact in the community. That's been camps across the country, that's camps internationally. We've built an autopsy initiative to be able to support families directly for in-custody deaths, whether that's police custody, whether that's incarceration, whether that's ICE detention centers, juvenile detention centers, where families can get free second autopsies so they understand how their loved one died. That gives them a pathway to legal representation. Also, there's financial barrier within that, $10,000 to $15,000 per autopsy.

So that's a piece of it. We've done a legal defense initiative. to be able to protect protesters during 2020 in the protests that followed George Floyd. We had pro bono legal services that we went out and represented people. We've had a COVID relief fund. Like, I would just say collectively look at the body

of actions and work that's been done. If you still think it's insincere, like, hey, that's your opinion around it. what I would say is even if you think it's insincere, I hope you go out and do the work that needs to be done to build rules forward collectively. Yeah, I mean, you just laid that out perfectly. Ed, I want to touch on something you said

before you laid out in ways that you've been sincere and stayed consistent in that. You talked about support, getting support from people, and I'm wondering, I can't even imagine the mental toll that even to this day all of this takes on you. and how you've had to be vulnerable, but like strong at the same time. But support.

You went from seeing people, support you on social media publicly, support you privately in conversation, support you publicly on national television, whether it's wearing your jersey, and then you also see people like then turn on that. I'm wondering what has that shift taught you about people who are actually in your corner?

when there's not something to gain on the table. Yeah. That's a really good question. I would say the protest and what has followed has been very revealing to me. I would say immediately with the protest, I think was a very unique moment that I don't think most people get to experience where everybody around you reveals who they are so clearly that you have a much easier path to be able to decipher who's going to be supportive and who isn't on that journey.

I've also, within that, got to see people who were initially supportive because they thought they had something to benefit from it. and as soon as there was no longer a benefit to them, then it was like, well, I'm going to shift and do something else. I'm going to make different decisions, different moves. And I think part of that goes to the conversation around keeping the focus on the goal. I don't know if the goal was always solely trying to address police brutality or if part of that goal for people was, yeah, I'll help address.

this but to my own benefit in elevation and like once I get the opportunity like I'm going to run with the opportunities and I got to see that play out as well you know you we'll use the example that you mentioned earlier like we got to see this play out with Nate Boyer and we go in more detail in the book I love that if you read the book for one thing you need to know the truth about that story like that that was one early indication of how people were going to going to move. And we've seen that, I've got to see that play out over the last 10 years. What I will say is it has given me such a deep appreciation for people who are doing this work every day, often thankfully, thankfully, and continue to show up for our communities while people

have abandoned them, while people have left them. And it's something that I hope. people realize and take away is, no, you don't get, you shouldn't just show up in the moment. You need to continuously show up. And it may look different in different ways, depending on where your position is and where you're sitting in that moment. But you have to keep showing up if we're actually going to make progress collectively, if you are actually passionate and focused on the work. So I have three questions left. I'm going to start with one. are some of the activists that you look out there right now who you you admire and they're

doing some of the work that you love one of one of my favorite people out there uh kevin livingston um in new york uh kevin we initially met in i think 2015 2016 he has an organization hard suits for harmon um trying to address uh incarceration but also preparing young men coming out and getting them job placement and making sure that they're set up to be successful on the other side of that. He is someone that I've seen from the early days of the organization where people were not supporting him in the way that I thought they should have been to someone who has gotten massive support. Also someone who has gotten massive support. Also someone who when approached with opportunities,

financial opportunities, that would be countered to the mission and goal, he's turned those down and continued to work and stay focused. So I call him out specifically, shout out to Kevin, but he's just one of many across the country that we see doing this type of work. But I think staying true on that path and also making sure

having an awareness of the actions that you take and where you compromise and where you don't also sends a message to everyone else around you of what we think is okay as a community. And I call him out because he has been very consistent and focused within that. I'm gonna say three names right now. This is besides the activist question.

I'm just gonna say three names, you tell me what comes in your mind. Eric Reed, Kenny Stills, Brandon Marshall. Oh, that was my brothers. So Eric Reed, I give some context on this one. Eric Reed, first person to take a knee with me. He's the person who came up with the idea for us to take a knee. We talked about him advocating for players' rights and the medical benefits for retired players.

He also continued the protest after I was blackballed. His last season in the NFL played for the kids. Carolina Panthers, set two franchise records, was cut and never played again. Now, the safety that he had comparable stats to, they were one to that year, signed a contract extension, four years, $60 million. Eric never saw the field again. Kenny still similarly targeted throughout the rest of his career as he took a knee, continued protesting.

We saw this down in Miami where he was playing. Ultimately affected some of the success of his career and the trajectory of it. But he stayed consistent to this day in his positions. He's not wavered on that.

Despite the personal sacrifices that came along with it. Brandon Marshall, love Brandon. Also for clarity for everybody out there. Brandon Marshall, linebacker for the Broncos. I'm back for the Broncos, yeah. Not the receiver of Brandon Marshall, but shout out to that, Brandon, too.

But Brandon Marshall was my line brother and teammate at Nevada. Also protested while he was in Denver. Had endorsement deals taken away from him, continued protesting, just three incredibly strong people that have been resilient and consistent. The book is available. September 15th. They can pre-order it now. Yes. One place that the book is not going to be available is Target. Can not pre-order there. Can not get the book there. Walk me through the decision to pull the book from being sold at Target because I think there's a lot of speculation around it.

Is it directly because of the boycott that's happening? Is it in response to the freestyle? Or is this something that had been in the works internally with you and your team before? Yeah. So, to your point, book is not available at Target. The reason the book got pulled from Target is, one, someone made us aware. We knew the Target boycott was going on. We haven't been shopping at Target. We haven't been doing all those things. Someone sent us, hey, your book showed up on Target.

Like, why is this the case? I think they sent it to, it was either to my wife or someone on our team. I was like, oh, I didn't know that. So as soon as we saw that was the case, we're like, no, we're not selling at Target. But the publishers control the distribution as part of it. Now, unless you dive into it, you don't know every bookstore and every place that it's ultimately going to be sold. So as soon as we were aware of it, we're like, oh, we have to pull it. We're not going to sell it there.

We're not supporting Target. We're supporting the boycott of Target. And that also, because I've seen this conversation come up as well, with our children, books that were out there. Those were out well before the boycott took place. Again, those were in partnership with Scholastic. We weren't looking for

where distribution was at that point because those are out in the world. But as soon we were made aware that those were in Target as well when we started searching, we pulled those too. I think to me, the most important point is you may not be aware of everything that's happening at any given moment. But as soon as you're aware of it and have

the information, then what do you do? And to me, that becomes important that the boycott is going on, is continuing. Yes, will this have financial implications on the sale of the book? Yes. But that's not the most important part here. We are collectively trying to send a message, not just the target, but to be able to send that to corporate America. If you don't support the interests of the people, we're not going to support you. That's going to hurt your bottom line. And within the corporate realm, the best action that you can take or the most impactful one that they typically respond to is boycotts. They have fiduciary responsibility. They are trying to maximize profit. If you pull their profit away, they have to take different actions. That's why boycotts are so effective.

And I think for us collectively, we have to understand that and also be resilient in it and say, no, we're going to continue this until we achieve the goals and objectives that we've set out for. Last one. Are you at peace? I think different variations of that. At peace with the decisions I've made and the approaches I've taken, yes. at peace with the outcomes? No. Ultimately, I want to be back on the field. Ultimately, I want to see an end to police brutality

and to mass incarceration. There's still a ton of work to be doing there. Also, since the protest, police budgets have continued to bloat. Police killings have continued to rise. So there's still significant. work that has to be done. So while I'm at peace with decisions that have been made and looking forward to how do we continue to build and improve, being at peace with the outcomes, no, there's still way more

to do. Last question for me. When a young football player, young athlete comes up to you and tells you they have dreams about playing in the league, what do you say to them? it depends what their framework is and I think they should chase their dream and passion and take it as far as they can I think they should also be aware of what that entails and I'll I'll actually give a specific example here because I had a similar question like this actually come from a high school kid we had our know your rights camp in Las Vegas and in between our our sessions at a young man pulled me to the side and he was like hey i got to ask you something he was like no i love playing football and you know i want to go college and ultimately play professionally like i want to do that no i also love and want to fight for my community like which one do you think

i should choose and to me that created a very clear reality of the message that's been sent And ultimately, my response to that is, you don't have to choose and you shouldn't have to choose. You can do both of those at the same time. I think part of our responsibility is making sure that we're helping and create the environment where he never has to choose one or the other. He is able to chase his passions and be great at it while also making sure that he's taking care of

and fighting for the people around him to be able to have a better life as well. The book is The Perilist Fight. It comes out September 15th. Colin Kaepernick, thank you, man. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for coming. Thank you, brother.