TO UNDERSTAND Donald Trump’s motivations, it is often best to skip his formal addresses and watch him in action on the stump. At a rally in Alabama on September 22nd in support of Luther Strange, Mr Trump’s preferred candidate for the senate seat vacated by Jeff Sessions, the president started harrumphing against players in the National Football League (NFL) who protest against police brutality and racial discrimination. Mr Trump suggested that players who rest on one knee during the national anthem be summarily fired by their teams, as their actions dishonoured America and its flag. Their protests, he argued, symbolised a league in decline.

Mr Trump rehashed his arguments on Twitter the following day. In doing so, he elevated an issue that had previously been largely confined to sporting arenas into a nationwide debate. In August 2016 a quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, Colin Kaepernick, began resting on one knee during the pre-game playing of the anthem (a protest that led Mr Trump to tell him to “find a country that works better for him”). His protest was briefly adopted by others, but its primary impact was on Mr Kaepernick himself, who opted out of his contract at the end of last season. He has been unable to find another team since, even though consensus suggests that he is good enough to compete. The situation has been an embarrassment, albeit a contained one, for the NFL at the start of its new season.

Mr Trump's tweets, however, have reframed the argument. The response from the NFL’s owners, teams and players has been vigorous and united. The weekend’s round of games saw some teams delay taking to the field until after the anthem had been played. Others saw strings of players on one knee or with arms linked together. Several team owners issued statements in support of their players’ right to protest. The owner of the New England Patriots, Robert Kraft, a friend and donor to Mr Trump, said he was “deeply disappointed” by the president’s comments. Martha Firestone Ford, owner of the Detroit Lions, suggested Mr Trump’s view was “contrary to the founding principles of our country”. Images from the anthems covered the front pages of the following day’s newspapers.

Given Mr Trump’s historically low approval ratings, his administration’s lack of legislative achievements and multiple foreign-policy challenges, why politicise sport, one of the most reliable unifiers of America? The president has regularly used his Twitter feed to create distractions and the coming days are unlikely to be kind to him. The Republicans’ final, pre-midterm attempt to repeal and replace Obamacare has just failed in the Senate, and Mr Strange lost his primary. The president is comfortable stirring up culture wars. His equivocal response to a protest march by white supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia, was designed to demonstrate where his loyalties lay. Criticism of rich, non-white and “unpatriotic” sportsmen is likely to be well received by his base. Mr Trump seems to revel in the fact that his comments on white-nationalist marchers and African-American footballers put his wealthy, white enemies in the Republican Party in tortuous positions. Indeed, he is unlikely to be harmed by this latest tirade. More vulnerable are the moderate Republicans who will attempt to defend him, and the victims whose plight Mr Kaepernick attempted to highlight, and who have been ignored amid the president’s invective.

Note (September 28th, 2017): The original image accompanying this post showed a player with the Pittsburgh Steelers, Chris Hubbard, kneeling on the turf. The Steelers have asked us to clarify that Mr Hubbard was actually saying a prayer after the completion of the national anthem. Sorry for the oversight.