There is a growing movement that calls for Condoleezza Rice to become the next NFL commissioner — a movement that includes her former colleagues in the Bush administration.
Rice, who served as George W. Bush's National Security Advisor (2001-2005) and Secretary of State (2005-2009), has been an NFL fan for years. Karl Rove, Bush's former deputy chief of staff, said Rice would be a good pick to replace Roger Goodell, who has come under fire for how the league handled the Ray Rice domestic violence incident.
"I think Condi would succeed in any job she had, as she did when she was National Security Advisor, Secretary of State, Provost of Stanford, etc.,"
Rove told Buzzfeed. "If it's a job she wants, with her encyclopedic knowledge of the sport and passion for the game, I have no doubt she'd be great."
Added Rice's former State Department speech writer Elise Jordan: "She knows and loves the game, and her leadership could energize the league and attract a broader fan base for the sport."
Publicly, Goodell's handling of the Ray Rice situation is being called into question. A video was released on Monday that shows Rice
punching his wife in the head earlier this year. She was knocked unconscious and he dragged her into a hallway when the doors opened.
Goodell claims the NFL never saw the footage, which was taken from a surveillance camera, until it was posted to celebrity news website TMZ on Monday. But reports have since surfaced that
the NFL knew of the tape's existence months ago and did nothing about it.
Zalmay Khalilzad served as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations under Bush and said Secretary Rice has always been a football fan.
"She would talk a lot about it even with foreign leaders who did not necessarily follow the game," Khalilzad told Buzzfeed. "She brings energy, diversity, increased interest by women in the game…. I think it would be a positive change at the top. I think it would be great.
"When she sees a problem, she goes after it. She's tenacious."
Secretary Rice
told the New York Times in 2002 that her dream job was to be the NFL commissioner.
"I think it would be a very interesting job because I actually think football, with all due respect to baseball, is a kind of national pastime that brings people together across social lines, across racial lines," Rice said at the time. "And I think it's an important American institution."
Leading the NFL would not be Rice's first foray into the sports world. In 2012, she became one of the first two women to become a member at Augusta National Golf Club, which hosts the Masters every year.
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