Camping World CEO: Company won’t pull sponsorship after Trump support
Camping World CEO Marcus Lemonis wasn’t a fan of NASCAR CEO Brian France’s endorsement of Donald Trump on Monday.
Shortly after France endorsed Trump along with other current and former NASCAR drivers, Lemonis tweeted there was no place for political endorsements in business.
A NASCAR spokesperson called France’s endorsement a “personal, private decision,” though Trump tweeted Tuesday morning he was happy to have the endorsement of NASCAR.
And while Lemonis disagrees with France’s endorsement, he’s not going to escalate the matter by threatening to pull his company’s title sponsorship of NASCAR’s Truck Series. Camping World is in the third year of an extension that runs through the 2022 season.
Here’s what he told Sports Business Journal about France’s endorsement and the sponsorship.
“I am not going to give Brian France the credit for him to think that him crossing the line that I just defined is going to affect our support of a sport that has tons of fans and teams. I’m not going to give him the credit that his crossing that line would warrant us picking a side when at the end of the day, our allegiance is to the sport, which is much bigger than Brian France, and the teams and drivers, which is much bigger than Brian France, and to the fans who love the sport, which clearly is much bigger than Brian France. Brian France is not NASCAR. NASCAR is made up of the millions of fans who have their own views of the favorite sports teams, drivers, politicians and religion.”
Lemonis is also a big reason why France’s endorsement of Trump was so curious in the first place. After Lemonis wrote a public letter to France over the summer that he wouldn’t attend any of NASCAR’s banquets at Trump’s properties. NASCAR, which had scheduled to have the Truck Series and Xfinity Series banquets at the Trump Doral, said it would not have any events at Trump properties.
When announcing the decision in July, a NASCAR spokesperson said “Given all the attention brought to this matter and how it impacts our partners, sponsors, our teams and our drivers and certainly ourselves, it ultimately was a decision made today that we will not being going back there.”
Fast forward seven months and no one can debate there’s been a lot of attention brought to France’s Trump endorsement and how it impacts NASCAR partners, sponsors, teams and drivers. And the sanctioning body itself, too. Sprint’s sponsorship of the Sprint Cup Series ends after 2016 and NASCAR hasn’t lined up a replacement. As NASCAR continues its search, it remains to be seen if the Trump endorsement will have any effect.
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Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
