Last week, a soccer fan said he was kicked out of the Energizer Park stadium in St. Louis, Missouri, for wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.
As St. Louis City SC played Minnesota United FC, the fan in question, Michael Weitzel, documented his experience on video, in which he appeared to be escorted out of the stadium, and posted it on social media on July 26.
The video went viral shortly after.
“I am being threatened with arrest. They are asking me to leave,” Weitzel said in the video, with law enforcement and security personnel visible in the background. “Trump is not welcome in St. Louis City SC Club.”
In the video, Weitzel pointed to flags on display in the stadium and asked whether the stadium enforced the same rules across the board, to which the security personnel replied that the flags were preapproved. While escorting the fan out, the same officer told Weitzel that he was only following the rules of the stadium.
MAGA hat in the world of sports
Later, Weitzel told a local radio show that stadium personnel received complaints about him and approached him with 25 minutes remaining in the game.
“They told me I could either hide the hat or take it out to my car or leave. I’m not gonna take my hat off for anybody. I live in America, which is the land of the free and the home of the brave, I thought. So you do what you have to do.”
According to the St. Louis SC’s code of conduct, displaying “signs, symbols or images for commercial purposes or for electioneering, campaigning, or advocating for or against any candidate, political party, legislative issues or government action is prohibited.”
Missouri Republican Rep. Bob Onder in a post on X criticized the stadium for devoting so many agents to removing one attendee from the premises.
“So in St. Louis this year,” Onder posted on X, “there were 66 murders, 67 (kidnappings), 28 rapes, and 1,335 aggravated assaults. But there were four security personnel here to forcibly evict a peaceful soccer fan wearing a MAGA hat. Is the message that you do not want us in the city of St. Louis?”
Ryan Fournier, national chairman of Students for Trump, said in a post, “I smell a huge lawsuit,” while other users speculated about a First Amendment violation.
This isn’t the first time MAGA hats have popped up in the world of sports. Last year, the NFL fined San Francisco 49ers defensive end Nick Bosa for wearing a MAGA hat on the field during his team’s winning game against the Dallas Cowboys.
The MAGA hats may be popular among supporters of Trump, but does this enthusiasm translate to high levels of engagement with the Republican Party?
Study shows merch purchases signal lower political engagement
According to the latest study from the University of Arizona’s Eller College of Management, “buying political merchandise may actually make people less likely to volunteer, advocate or even vote.”
The study’s lead researcher Anastasiya Ghosh, associate professor of marketing, said researchers found a lack of relation between sporting political merchandise and making meaningful political contributions.
“Political slacktivism is when someone takes a symbolic action, like buying a T-shirt, but doesn’t follow through with deeper engagement,” said Ghosh, who is also the Susan and Philip Hagenah Endowed Faculty Fellow.
“It gives people the sense that they’ve done something important, even if they haven’t actually voted or volunteered.”
The researchers compared political behaviors of those who purchase merchandise and those who make contributions but don’t receive a tangible item in exchange over the course of several election cycles, starting from 2016.
“We found that wearing political merchandise in public — where others can see it — had a strong signaling effect,” Ghosh said. “But when people wore it in private settings, that effect all but disappeared. It’s really about demonstrating your support to others.”
To Ghosh’s surprise, those who bought merchandise “were actually less likely to vote.”
“I expected that they might skip a rally, but voting is such a fundamental action.”