Obama congratulates LeBron James on his NBA title, praises him for fighting for social justice

Barack Obama poured in congratulatory messages for LeBron James after the win in NBA championship and lauded him for his contributions for the country.  

“Proud of my friend @KingJames for his fourth title, fourth Finals MVP, and for not only living up to the hype after seventeen seasons, but surpassing it as an extraordinary leader both on the court and in the public arena fighting for education, social justice, and our democracy,” said the former president.

In the Game 6 of NBA finals, the Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Miami Heat 106-93, to end the series, making it the 17th NBA title for the team. After they won, the former president took to Twitter to congratulate the Lakers and the Seattle Storm — who were the winners of the WNBA Championship last Tuesday (Oct. 6).

“Congrats to the @Lakers and @Seattlestorm on their championship wins!” he tweeted. “Proud of all the NBA and WNBA teams and players who’ve been using their platforms to take a stand for racial justice and encourage civic participation this season.”

Both on the field and off, James has been a great leader and in the latter, he has been actively working in areas related education and social justice. In Akon, Ohio, he established the I PROMISE School, about two years ago and the students have been performing well. More than 90% of the students performed beyond expectations in math and reading.

The More Than a Vote initiative was also launched by James, to push for voter registration and to focus on the issue of voter suppression. Moreover, his recent initiative called “We Got Next” campaign recruited 10,000 poll workers to work in Black electoral districts before the election.

He has been speaking against police brutality and systemic racism as well. After the police shooting of Jacob Blake, he and several other players partook in the boycott of their playoff games to be vocal about this shooting as well as several others that have taken place.

“We see it over, and over, and over. If you watch the video, there was multiple moments where they could have tackled him,” James said, referring to the Blake shooting. “They could’ve grabbed him. They could have done that. Why does it always have to get to a point where we see the guns firing? And his family’s there; the kids are there. It’s in broad daylight.”

Check out Obama’s tweets below.