The NFL still isn’t budging in the Redskins name controversy.
The leader of the movement to change the team’s name expressed disappointment with the league’s continued defense of it during a 90-minute meeting Wednesday at the NFL’s Manhattan headquarters.
The league had agreed to the meeting in the wake of increasing protests about the name led by the Oneida Indian Nation, but commissioner Roger Goodell did not even bother to attend.
Ray Halbritter, official representative of the Oneida Nation, was dismayed after the three league officials that did meet with him appeared to dismiss the tribe’s concerns while reiterating the NFL’s defense of “the history and the legacy of the name.”
“We were somewhat disappointed — to put it mildly — that they continue to defend the use of this slur,” Halbritter said at a press conference afterward at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square. “It really does require us to redouble our efforts in dealing with this issue.”
Halbritter wouldn’t specify what that meant, but the tribe spelled it out in a letter delivered to the league during the meeting.
Oneida Nation demanded in that letter to meet with Redskins owner Dan Snyder and owners or representatives of the 31 other teams during Super Bowl week in New York next February, demanded the league sanction Snyder for using the name and demanded the NFL ban the use of racially offensive names.
The tribe also asked for Goodell and Snyder to visit their homeland in Verona, N.Y., which is near Syracuse.
The NFL released a statement after the meeting calling it “part of an ongoing dialogue to facilitate listening and learning.”
The league also appeared to reference its defense of the Redskins name in the statement by noting “the sharply differing views of many other Native Americans and fans in general” about the mascot.
With Goodell conspicuously absent, the league was represented at the meeting by senior vice president of government relations Adolpho Birch, lead attorney Jeff Pash and lead publicist Paul Hicks.
The NFL’s chilly response was not considered a surprise, considering Snyder has repeatedly insisted he will not change the name — including during a meeting Tuesday with Goodell in Manhattan.
Goodell also has defended the name publicly numerous times, including as recently as this month at the owners’ annual fall meeting when he said growing up in Washington he never considered the mascot derogatory.
Halbritter’s group also used the meeting to present a study it commissioned that showed what the tribe claims are the harmful psychological effects of the Redskins’ name on Native Americans.
The league did not immediately react to the request to meet with the owners or the tribe’s other demands, telling Halbritter it would give a response in the next two or three weeks.
Halbritter did not appear optimistic based on the tenor of the meeting.
“We didn’t get any indication anything would happen [to change the name] today or anytime in the near future,” Halbritter said. “They continue to use the defense that the name has a history that a lot of people are supportive of.”
Oneida Nation has been sponsoring radio advertisements and protests in the cities where the Redskins travel to play this season, although the tribe so far has been rebuffed in trying to place the ads on radio in Washington.
Halbritter’s post-meeting press conference was interrupted briefly by New York State assemblywoman Claudia Tenney, a longtime critic of Halbritter’s legitimacy to represent the tribe.
Tenney argued for several minutes with Halbritter and his representative before leaving when threatened with removal by hotel security.