Colin Kaepernick Served Food and Gave Out Suits as His Former Team Played in 2020 Super Bowl
Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick spent his day helping families in need while his old team faced the Kansas City Chiefs at Super Bowl LIV in Miami Gardens, Florida.
According to TMZ, Kaepernick visited the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture on Sunday, where he toured the Harlem, New York, building and chatted with employees. The center is known as the world’s leading cultural institution devoted to the “research, preservation, and exhibition of materials focused on African American, African Diaspora, and African experiences.”
The 32-year-old — who has been a free agent since opting out of his NFL contract with the 49ers in 2017 — then met with his former teammate Eric Reid at the SCO Family Shelter in Jamaica, Queens. Once there, TMZ reported the two passed out clothing with the charity, 100 Suits for 100 Men.
TMZ obtained footage of Kaepernick helping some of the recipients try on their new outfits.
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Kaepernick then served food at the shelter with members of Know Your Rights Camp and the Lower East Side Girls Club of New York.
Representatives for Kaepernick and the Schomburg Center did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s requests for comment.
The former quarterback made headlines in 2016 when he opted to kneel during the national anthem in a preseason game with the 49ers. The act sparked both a powerful movement and intense backlash.
Sunday’s trip to the Super Bowl was the first time the 49ers had gone to the big game since Kaepernick helped lead them there in 2013.
The 49ers lost the 2020 Super Bowl to the Chiefs 20-34.
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While Kaepernick was not mentioned during the game’s broadcast, he still was the subject of conversation on social media.
RELATED: Kansas City Chiefs Beat San Francisco 49ers to Win Super Bowl 2020
FOX, the station broadcasting the game, controversially displayed O.J. Simpson’s name and picture in a pre-game graphic that included a group of players recently named as the 100 Greatest of All-Time. Simpson, of course, was famously acquitted in the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman in 1995.
Some on social media were surprised that the NFL would honor a controversial player such as Simpson, while Kaepernick has not been signed to a team after his protests in the name of racial equality.
