In the hours leading up to the Super Bowl, what should have been a pure football buildup was jolted by a political controversy that crossed into the NFL spotlight. It all started when a racially offensive video tied to President Donald Trump’s social media account triggered swift backlash and was deleted. But by then, what began online had spilled into locker rooms. Before kickoff arrived, a Dallas Cowboys defender stepped into the conversation with a pointed response that made his stance clear without saying a name.

Overshown addressed the situation directly on his X profile, making his stance clear without naming names.

“WE all seen it. stand for something or fall for anything,” he wrote on X, sending a pointed message that caught attention.

Trump had reposted the video on Thursday to his 11.7 million followers on Truth Social. The clip also featured a narrator pushing unproven claims about voter fraud in battleground states during the 2020 election, which former President Joe Biden won.

However, the most disturbing part of the video came at the very end, where the outrage truly exploded. In the closing seconds, images of the former president and first lady appeared, edited onto the bodies of primates. As those figures started moving against a jungle background, the song “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” played.

The video, which appeared to be partially AI-generated, spliced the faces of former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama onto dancing primates, imagery civil rights leaders called blatantly dehumanizing. The post reignited scrutiny over how content is reviewed on Trump’s account, especially given its ability to dominate national headlines within minutes.

The caricatures echoed a long-standing racist trope aimed at Black people, making the post even more offensive.

On Friday, Senator Tim Scott and several other Republican lawmakers, joined by Democrats and civil-rights groups, demanded the post’s removal, and the platform subsequently took it down. Trump initially defended the clip through White House aides, with one spokesperson brushing off the backlash as “fake outrage” before the administration quietly reversed course. Later that same day, Trump attempted to explain what happened, saying he had only viewed the opening portion of the video and forwarded it to a staffer who failed to watch it all. Still, Trump stopped short of taking responsibility.

“Somebody slipped and missed a very small part,” said Trump, while also declining to apologize as he insisted the mistake was not his. He added that he had seen thousands of clips that day and maintained that the post itself was not a mistake, only the failure to review the ending.

With the Super Bowl only happening in a few hours, the controversy has only grown. And, with voices like Overshown weighing in, the conversation has spilled beyond politics and straight into the NFL spotlight.

Donald Trump shares his views on the Super Bowl game

President Donald Trump has already confirmed that he will not be attending the Super Bowl LX matchup between the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks. Still, that did not stop him from weighing in on the game itself.

“I can’t say that. But they are really two good teams,” Trump said on picking a winner, while appearing on The Will Cain Show.

Trump also did not shy away from sharing his thoughts on the quarterbacks set to take the field. He pointed to the very different paths taken by Sam Darnold and Drake Maye leading up to this moment.

“You had one quarterback who looked like he wasn’t gonna make it, and he made it. And then you have another one who’s young, and they probably wish they played him last year, right? He’s been great,” Trump said.

However, his comments on Drake Maye raised some eyebrows when placed next to the actual timeline. In 2024, Maye started 13 games for the Patriots, completing 66.6 percent of his passes for 2,276 yards, along with 15 touchdowns and 10 interceptions.

While there is no denying he looked far more comfortable this year under Mike Vrabel, it is not as if he spent all of 2024 watching from the sideline, which makes the remark a bit puzzling.

But the recent numbers heading into this game tell a clear story. Darnold finished the 2025 season with a 99.1 passer rating, throwing for 4,048 yards, 25 touchdowns, and 14 interceptions across 17 games. On the other side, Maye posted a 113.5 rating, piling up 4,394 yards, 31 touchdowns, and just eight interceptions in the same span.

Now, with the stage set for these two quarterbacks, POTUS’s remarks add fuel to an already heated discussion.