San Fransisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick has never been registered to vote in any election, including the 2016 presidential contest, according to the Sacramento Bee.
Kaepernick has made headlines this football season for refusing to stand for the national anthem as a protest against the U.S., which he says "oppresses black people and people of color." But Kaepernick has not attempted to enact change through the electoral process. The quarterback has never cast his ballot in a single election, the Bee reported, citing state records.
Kaepernick, who was raised in Turlock, turned 18 in 2005, but he has not registered to vote in California at any point in the last decade, according to records maintained by the California Secretary of State. He also did not register in Nevada while he attended the University of Nevada, Reno, from 2006 to 2010, according to the Washoe County Registrar of Voters.
That means he missed presidential elections in 2008 and 2012–when Democrat Barack Obama was elected president–in addition to a variety of state and local elections in other years.
Kaepernick told reporters on Sunday that it would have been "hypocritical" for him to vote for either President-elect Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton.
"I said from the beginning I was against oppression, I was against the system of oppression," he said. "I'm not going to show support for that system. And to me, the oppressor isn't going to allow you to vote your way out of your oppression."
News of Kaepernick never voting came as a surprise to many because of his protests for racial equality that have made national headlines, inspiring similar actions in other venues. Kaepernick's protests began in August, when he refused to stand for the Star Spangled Banner before a game.
The quarterback's actions have been controversial. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, for example, has called Kaepernick's actions "dumb and disrespectful."
A Gold Star mother called him "ungrateful, privileged, and arrogant," the Washington Free Beacon reported in August.
"Mr. Kaepernick, I am sitting in my living room looking outside at my American Flag—flying at half staff. You see, my son's body lay in a street after an IED [improvised explosive device] blew up the vehicle he was fighting in. His blood stains the sands of Afghanistan," the mother wrote, according to a Sunday Twitter post from CNN anchor Jake Tapper.
"He died protecting the ideals of the flag you refuse to respect. He died so that ungrateful, privileged, arrogant men like you can be just that—ungrateful, privileged, and arrogant," continued the mother, who was unnamed.