Here is how the original comment happened. Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy asked Trump who he considered the greatest NBA player ever, LeBron or Michael Jordan. The question came hours after James announced he was leaving the Los Angeles Lakers to sign with the Philadelphia 76ers on a two year, $8 million deal for a record twenty fourth season. Trump chose Jordan, described him as a friend and a golf partner, then turned to James and said, “maybe he’s a racist.” He allowed that James might simply not like him, said he only likes people who like him, and gave Jordan the title.
Smith’s response was that the whole thing had gotten ridiculous. He described the divisiveness, the way Trump conducts himself, and the things he says as disgusting, and said it needed to be stated plainly rather than left alone. Calling LeBron James a racist, he said, is beyond the pale and crosses a line that cannot be excused. He said Trump should be ashamed, and that it matters for people to say so out loud rather than let it pass.
Then came the part that separates this from a standard cable segment. Smith acknowledged that he has had his own issues with James, and he was not soft about it. But he said you do not do that to him, that James does not deserve it, and that no American citizen deserves it from a sitting president. He landed on a nickname, suggesting Trump should be called Mr. Polarization, and closed the thought by saying you have got to be kidding me.
That admission is not throat clearing. Smith and James have a documented and genuinely bad relationship. Smith has criticized James repeatedly over the years and has been especially critical of his son Bronny James, who plays for the Lakers. In 2025 the two had a courtside confrontation at a Lakers game that made news on its own. There is no warmth between them and neither has pretended otherwise. Smith stepping in to defend him anyway is the actual news here, because it means the objection is not about loyalty to LeBron.
Smith went further later in the segment, saying that things like this have to get called out for what they are, that the world only improves when people name trifling behavior when they see it, and that the rule holds even when the person doing it is the commander in chief. He described the remark as another swipe thrown at somebody to pull attention away from the work Trump is supposed to be doing.
The history behind all of this runs almost a decade. James endorsed Hillary Clinton in 2016, Joe Biden in 2020, and Kamala Harris in 2024. In 2017 Trump called James a bum after James defended Stephen Curry for declining a White House visit. In 2018, after James did a CNN interview with Don Lemon criticizing Trump for using sports to divide the country, Trump posted that the interview made James look smart. In 2021 Trump released a statement calling James’s comments racist and divisive after James posted about the police killing of sixteen year old Ma’Khia Bryant. Friday’s remark is the newest entry in a feud that has been running since Trump’s first term.
James is 41 and heading into his twenty fourth NBA season, with four championships, four MVP awards, and three Olympic gold medals behind him. He has said this is his last decision and that he is not playing for money.
One layer worth noting on the Stephen A. Smith Trump dynamic. Smith has openly floated a 2028 presidential run as a Democrat, and Trump has previously spoken favorably about the idea. The two have been friendly in public before. That makes Monday’s commentary a break rather than a continuation, and it is why the clip traveled the way it did.
Smith’s argument was not that LeBron James is beyond criticism. He spent part of the segment making clear that he has done plenty of criticizing himself. The argument was about what a president should be willing to say about a private citizen, and about what it means when the answer to a question about basketball is an accusation of racism.
