Kansas City Council will not apologize to Harrison Butker over viral tweet

Kansas City officials will not apologize to Harrison Butker for a viral tweet from a city account.

A resolution to issue a formal apology to the Chiefs kicker was voted down by the Kansas City Council Thursday afternoon.

The tweet in question read, “Just a reminder that Harrison Butker lives in the City of Lee’s Summit.” It appeared for a few minutes on the city’s official X account, formerly Twitter, four days after Butker’s viral graduation address at Benedictine College in Atchinson, Kansas.

The resolution was sponsored by Councilman Nathan Willett, who wrote the city’s tweet mocked Butker on the basis of his religious beliefs. Butker is a conservative Catholic, and Benedictine College is a private Catholic college.

The failed resolution also thanked Butker “for his many contributions to the greater Kansas City community both on and off the field.”

“Mr. Butker did not ask the city of Kansas City to weigh in on this issue,” Willett said.

An apology tweet was issued from the same X account that day. Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas also offered an apology on his personal X account.

But several council members said Butker owed the city an apology, instead of the other way around.

“The comments that Mr. Butker made towards women — young women — when I hear an apology for that, then I will vote to apologize to him,” said Councilman Kevin O’Neill, an alumnus of Benedictine College.

Butker has been widely criticized for the content of his 20-minute speech, in which he said “homemaker” is one of a woman’s most important titles. Butker also criticized President Joe Biden for his stance on abortion and made inflammatory comments about the LGBTQ+ community, calling Pride Month an example of the “deadly sins.”

Discourse around the tweet harmed city employees, many of whom were doxxed online, said Councilman Eric Bunch. Twitter users found and shared the addresses of several staffers, as well as photos of their homes.

Employees of the city communications department, as well as of city hall at large, were affected, council members said.

“I’m just going to take a second to apologize to our staff, who faced a barrage of hateful comments, who faced absolute horrific racism and harassment and death threats, for no reason other than a person made a mistake,” Bunch said.

The social media manager responsible for the viral tweet no longer works for the city, Mayor Quinton Lucas told KCMO Talk Radio on Thursday.

Ten council members voted against apologizing to Butker. Two abstained, with Willett the as the lone yes.

At Thursday’s city council meeting, Lucas said apologizing to Butker would ring false when the city has yet to apologize for more harmful actions.

“My mother was actually born in a segregated hospital in this city,” Lucas said. “We have had incidents where people have died as a result of the actions of city employees and others, for which we have not apologized. There are many things which we do not regularly apologize for. This, with respect, is grandstanding.”

Others explained their vote was based on Butker’s speech, rather than his faith.

“As a lifelong Catholic who attended Catholic school from K-12, I can say proudly that I received a very different Catholic education than Mr. Butker did, and practiced in a very different way,” Councilman Crispin Rea said.

Celebrities, teammates and thousands of people worldwide have weighed in on Butker’s words. Though the Chiefs organization has not taken an official team stance on the speech, the wife and eldest daughter of team chairman Clark Hunt have praised Butker, while the NFL has distanced itself from the kicker’s words. Chiefs coach Andy Reid said this week that Butker’s speech reflected the diversity of views among players.

For now, Kansas City Council members will remain silent on the issue, at least as far as the tweet goes.

That is, unless Butker goes first.

“When Mr. Butker apologizes — looks my daughters in the eyes and tells them that they have more worth than serving a man — then I will issue an apology to him,” Bunch said.