Home for Election Day, Bears encourage themselves, and others, to vote

Under an agreement between all NFL teams and the players’ union, the Bears are closing their practice facility Tuesday for Election Day.

Players reported to Halas Hall on Monday to do their typical Tuesday work, but will have Tuesday off.

“I think it’s a good thing,” Bears coach Matt Nagy said. “And I know our guys are going to be excited to be able to partake in all that and understand where we’re at.”

In the wake of the George Floyd killing in May, the Bears made a list of how they could affect change. They decided to allow players to register to vote in Cook County the day they reported to summer camp at Halas Hall.

“My family’s big on using your rights,” inside linebacker Danny Trevathan said. “Back in the day, [Black citizens] didn’t have those rights, as you know. So, people worked hard for us to have that right to vote. I think it’s very, very important that I, myself and many others like myself go out there and vote, to use that right.

“We never had that before back in the day. It’s very important we use our platform to speak our voice on it and try to influence people to go out there and do the same.”

The NFL says that 90% of its players are registered to vote, and that multiple teams have 100% participation.

“We definitely did a good job as a team talking about it,” safety DeAndre Houston-Carson said. “I know as defensive backs it’s something that we’ve been talking about just with everything going on, the importance of voting.

“So I think this year in particular — maybe more so than other years — it’s just getting me excited, man.”