The Women's National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA) released a statement on Friday, Aug. 7 denouncing transphobia and other forms of hate amid a surge of political attention toward the league. The message was addressed "to everyone who loves this game," and posted via social media. "The WNBPA represents 200+ individual people with different lived experiences, cultures, lifestyles, and opinions.We embrace justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion," the statement said. "Hate, abuse, and demonization of any person or group of people, including transgender people, only fuel fear, division, and harm. We will continue to have hard conversations. But we will not be used as political pawns. "Support the Players. Support the Fans. At games, notify
security if you witness hateful, violent, or abusive behavior. Online, report abusive posts and drown out the bots and bad actors. At home, tell your elected officials to strengthen Title IX."
More on Enes Kanter Freedom & Royce White: Recent HoopsHype Rumors
The Women's National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA) released a statement on Friday, Aug. 7 denouncing transphobia and other forms of hate amid a surge of political attention toward the league. The message was addressed "to everyone who loves this game," and posted via social media. "The WNBPA represents 200+ individual people with different lived experiences, cultures, lifestyles, and opinions.We embrace justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion," the statement said. "Hate, abuse, and demonization of any person or group of people, including transgender people, only fuel fear, division, and harm. We will continue to have hard conversations. But we will not be used as political pawns. "Support the Players. Support the Fans. At games, notify security if you witness hateful, violent, or abusive behavior. Online, report abusive posts and drown out the bots and bad actors. At home, tell your elected officials to strengthen Title IX." — 8/8/2026 USA Today Sports
A second former NBA player now says he plans to enter the 2027 WNBA Draft. Just hours after Enes Kanter Freedom announced that he planned to enter, White, who is also running in Minnesota’s Aug. 11 Republican Primary for Senate, told Fox News that he also plans to enter the draft. “I’m transgender. I’m a woman.” White told Fox. “I identify as sometimes identifying as a woman for purpose of basketball, professional basketball, so I’ll be declaring for the WNBA Draft in 2027 as well.” — 8/8/2026 Oregonian
A Hennepin County judge has ordered U.S. Senate candidate Royce White not to contact his ex-wife and son, finding the former basketball star liable for abuse that left his family “plainly in fear.” The order for protection prohibits White from contact with his ex-wife for 50 years and with his teenage son for two years. — 4/25/2026 Minneapolis Star-Tribune
“She chose to play for a country that is literally responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of its own people, and literally running a concentration camp while we’re talking,” Freedom said, comparing Gu’s silence on the issue to LeBron James’ declining a question about China’s alleged human rights abuses in 2019. — 2/19/2026 New York Post
Former NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom condemned the American-born Team China Olympic skier Eileen Gu during an interview on Fox News’ “Ingraham Angle” on Tuesday. “I’m just going to say it, she’s a traitor,” Freedom said. “She was born in America. She was raised in America, lives in America, and chooses to compete against her own country for, literally, the worst human rights abuser on the planet, China. She built her fame in a free country, and then chooses to represent an authoritarian regime.” — 2/19/2026 New York Post
Enes Kanter Freedom: Hey @SHAQ , Let me teach you a lesson. At what point do you choose morals over money? Whether you were paid for these photo ops or not is irrelevant. You willingly posed next to a man the entire world knows is a dictator. And let’s be clear about who you chose to stand with. This is a dictator who - Bombs Kurdish villages and is responsible for the murder of thousands of innocent civilians. - Actively weaponizes ISIS for political leverage. - Controls and weaponizes HTS. - Uses refugees as a weapon to threaten and blackmail Europe. - Helps criminal regimes like Iran and Venezuela evade U.S. sanctions. - Throws infants and innocent civilians into prison. This is not ignorance. This is not neutrality. This is complicity. So before smiling for cameras with a world known dictator, ask yourself one question: How much is your integrity worth? Because when you choose money and access over morals, values, and principles, you are no longer neutral. You are helping normalize evil. I am not trying to embarrass you. I am holding you accountable. You are one of the most recognizable athletes on the planet. Millions of people, especially kids, look up to you. When you stand next to a tyrant, you help launder his crimes and give him legitimacy. You do not need this. You do not need his money. You do not need his approval. What you are doing is beneath you. History is very clear about people who chose comfort and profit over courage. Choose wisely. — 1/29/2026 x.com
Anti-establishment Republican and former NBA player Royce White lost his bid for a U.S. Senate seat Tuesday after falling to incumbent Democrat Sen. Amy Klobuchar in Minnesota's top election matchup. White had acknowledged he was as surprised as anyone when the state Republican Party endorsed him in May, but the self-described populist went on to get a plurality in the August primary against a more conventional Republican, Navy veteran Joe Fraser. — 11/6/2024 ESPN
White tweeted that he's not done with trying to change the GOP in Minnesota and nationally, and he questioned whether Senate Republicans will use their new majority to put America's interests first and slow the decline of the nation. White was a first-round pick by the Houston Rockets in 2012 but never played for the team after disclosing mental health issues and saying he did not want to fly to road games with the team. He signed multiple 10-day contacts with the Sacramento Kings in 2013, playing in three games, but was eventually let go before playing overseas for several years. — 11/6/2024 ESPN
Royce White: Obviously World War II needs to be retaught to the American public. It seems people forget we were allied with the communists, and then absorbed the fascists into our military and academic institutions. Then we started a Cold War with the very "allies" we had fought with. Only to have the entire global economy monopolized by death and debt warmongers. — 10/5/2024 x.com
Royce White: Best shooter of all-time… Air-balled on this one. Men saying Women’s reproductive rights as their top policy response, is such a blatant virtue signal, it might be the weakest thing I’ve ever seen. The issue is not being taken back from the states, stop the cap. The whole thing is becoming a straw man to justify voting for Democrats that have lost their minds. Steph, tell me about the women’s rights for Uyghur muslims… All those women and girls… thrown in prison camps for their faith and ethnicity. Not a peep from you or the NBA. Just shut up if you won’t keep it real. — 9/7/2024 x.com
Conservative populist and former NBA player Royce White defeated Navy veteran Joe Fraser in Minnesota's primary election for the Republican nomination on Tuesday and will challenge Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar in November. White was a first-round pick by the Houston Rockets in 2012 but never played for the team after disclosing mental health issues and saying he did not want to fly to road games with the team. He signed multiple 10-day contacts with the Sacramento Kings in 2013, playing in three games, but was eventually let go before playing overseas for several years. The 33-year-old White, who was an outspoken advocate for mental health awareness in sports, also considered a future in mixed martial arts but lost his only professional fight in 2021. — 8/14/2024 ESPN
White tells Scoop B Radio that he believes that Donald Trump is the right candidate for the United States of America over Biden. “I think that Donald Trump would be the better presidential candidate,” said White. “I don’t even think it’s close. But again that’s not the issue about the presidency. The issue is about the ideas. The idea that citizenship is of value should mean a lot to Black people. If you’re not a citizen then you should not have rights. Why would Black people want to trade our national rights, our constitutional rights for global rights?Are you a global citizen? Are you a citizen of the whole world? Hell no you’re not a citizen of the whole world! There is no such thing as global citizenship. Constitutional rights states that if you do not have a border, then you don’t have a country. If you do not have a country then you are not a citizen. If you’re not a citizen, then you can’t have rights. So the issue is that it comes down to fundamental things like that. It has nothing to do with and it has nothing to do with Biden or Trump personally, it’s about the ideas.” — 7/1/2024 ScoopB.com
“I’m not one of these Negroes that grew up in the bourgeois suburbs. I just didn’t. I grew up in the neighborhood. A real neighborhood. I know people that’ve spent 18 years in the Feds or people who had trumped up indictments with evidence that wasn’t there and STILL got prosecuted; selectively due to all kinds of policies that came from the national level on down. See back where I’m from where I was growing up, the view was you can’t trust the judicial system and as soon as the Democrats get their agenda and pass it through, all of the sudden I’m supposed to trust that? It’s just a lie and we’re sick of the lies. That’s it.” — 7/1/2024 ScoopB.com
“How much longer are Black folks are gonna vote Democrat and have them give you empty promises, you know? Is that right? How much longer? And for me you know it’s like if you keep promising something and your excuses are always They didn’t let us do it or the Republicans didn’t allow us to… they had three branches of government and the LGBTQ+ got all the policy first. The first time the Democrats had all three branches of government in recent history, the priority was the LGBTQ+. And that’s not really why we’re really done with the Democrats. That was just an insult. That was just salt in the open wound. But the reality is that Black people have been fooled.” — 7/1/2024 ScoopB.com
FREEDOM: So it’s actually very crazy because once I started to talk about China, I sit down with some of the government officials, and they literally briefed me about which government can hurt me in what way. Because I don’t only talk about Turkey, I talk about the problems are happening in China, Russia, Iran, and many other dictatorships. So I remember sitting down and having a conversation with these government officials. They’re like, “Listen, going forward. Here’s some of the challenges you are going to face.” The first topic, so they literally briefed me one by one, what government can hurt me, in what way. They said, the first one is China. They said, “Going forward, you will be getting text messages, DMs, tweets or random phone calls from one of the most beautiful girls in the world. Do not answer any of them. They are Chinese spies.” — 11/30/2023 KOSU
This article originally appeared on Hoops Hype: WNBPA denounces transphobia after Enes Kanter Freedom, Royce White comments
