Seahawks’ Michael Bennett on Trump’s hot-mic comments: ‘As a parent of daughters, I was irate’

RENTON – The 2016 presidential election remains a popular topic among Seahawks players, especially in Michael Bennett’s section of the locker room.

Typically unafraid to voice his beliefs, political or otherwise, Bennett held court with several media members Monday and spoke out against Donald Trump. The Seahawks’ media guidelines restrict what can be reported from inside the locker room – such as what songs are playing over personal loud speakers – but suffice it to say, Bennett does not approve of the Republican nominee.

Bennett said he was flying Sunday night during the second presidential debate but has seen some of it since then. After referring to the recently-released audio of Trump making lewd comments about women, including one about grabbing them by their genitals, Bennett was asked how he feels about Trump being one of the presidential candidates.

“It’s kind of crazy with all the stuff that’s going on,” he said. “To have a (candidate) that doesn’t understand the people, I think it’s kind of a disgrace a little bit.”

Bennett was asked how he, as a parent of three daughters, reacted when he heard Trump’s leaked comments.

“As a parent of daughters, I was irate,” Bennett said before referring to Trump’s insistence that it was “locker room talk,” which he called it while apologizing for the comments. “Locker room talk? I don’t even know if that’s locker room talk. I just thought that was kind of crazy to be talking about a woman like that. All these women in the world. I mean, a woman is so important. Without a woman, none of us would be here. You can’t disrespect women at all. All this stuff that’s going on, it’s just terrible.”

Bennett answered in the affirmative when asked if he, as an athlete, dislikes that depiction of typical locker room conversations.

“Oh yeah. Definitely,” he said. “I don’t think anybody goes out (of) their way to disrespect women in that type of way or feels that because (of) their situation, that they can disrespect women because if you’re a superstar you get away with things. That’s not so true. When it comes to people, you’ve got to treat people right and treat women with respect.”

Bennett said the Seahawks’ locker room is paying close attention to the presidential debates in particular and the race in general.

“Everybody is paying attention to what’s going on at this point in time,” he said. “We want to see how the country is going to change with all the racism and things going on in America. Everybody’s paying attention to the debates and everybody on the team is talking about it. We all want to do our part.”

Doug Baldwin refuted the notion that Trump’s comments were typical of a locker room. Not so in the Seahawks’ locker room, he said.

“I’m not going to judge a man in that light, because everybody says dumb stuff at times. Everybody makes mistakes,” Baldwin said. “I’m not too surprised by that, I’ll say that. Have I heard things like that in the locker room? Not that aggressively. Again, locker room talk, it can be aggressive sometimes. But I don’t think I’ve heard – ever heard – anything like that.”

Baldwin was asked if that paints actual locker rooms in a bad light.

“Maybe, because he’s not in the locker room,” Baldwin said. “He’s not in a violent sport. So I don’t know if he really knows what locker room talk is. It’s not that, I can tell you that.”