Governor: No position on Mississippi players’ anthem kneeling

JACKSON, Miss. — Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant said Tuesday that he hasn’t given much thought about the University of Mississippi basketball players who knelt during the national anthem to protest a pro-Confederate gathering on campus.

“I’ve been in Washington and I’ve been dealing with the storms and just haven’t had much of a chance to look at it,” Bryant said at the state Capitol.

Bryant, a Republican who is in his eighth and final year as governor, was in Washington during the weekend for a National Governors’ Association meeting and other activities. He issued an emergency declaration Monday because of tornadoes and flooding since Friday in Mississippi.