Nancy Pelosi Suggests the Washington Redskins Should Be Stripped of Their Trademark

The Washington Redskins moniker will continue to be a major point of contention until Daniel Snyder relents on a name change (one would guess that will happen eventually, if not imminently), and one possible circumstance of public leverage emerged today when Nancy Pelosi spoke to the National Congress of American Indians.

“We all respect freedom of speech, but the trademark office has rejected names which are considered offensive and they should do it now,” the House Minority Leader said, via Huffington Post. “They can keep their name on the team, but when it comes to all the stuff — that’s serious money. So I think that is one path that we can go.”

Back in September, Keith Olbermann theorized that the reason that Daniel Snyder ultimately changes the name will probably not be public coercion, but money. If there were the sort of forcible action from the government that Pelosi appears to be lobbying for — and there is copious precedent for the rejection (though not necessarily rescinding) of trademarks that contain the word ‘Redskin’ — perhaps that process would be expedited.

[H/T PFT]