Washington Redskins name controversy

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The Washington Redskins name controversy involved the name and logo previously used by the Washington Commanders, a National Football League (NFL) franchise located in the Washington metropolitan area. In the 1960s, the team's longtime name—the Redskins—and the associated logo began to draw criticism from Native American groups and individuals.^[2] The topic, part of the larger Native American mascot controversy, began receiving widespread public attention in the 1990s. In 2020, the team responded to economic pressure in the wake of the George Floyd protests by retiring the name and logo. The team called itself the "Washington Football Team" before rebranding as the Commanders in 2022.

"Redskin" is a slang term for Native Americans in the United States and First Nations in Canada. The term redskin underwent pejoration through the 19th to early 20th centuries and in contemporary dictionaries of American English it is labeled as offensive, disparaging, or insulting.

For several decades, the team's owners and management, NFL commissioners, and most fans sought to keep the Redskins name, claiming that it honored the achievements and virtues of Native Americans and that it was not intended in a negative manner. Then-team president Bruce Allen noted that three high schools with a Native American-majority student body used the name.^[3][4] Supporters also pointed to a national poll taken in 2004 by the Annenberg Public Policy Center, which found that a majority of Native Americans were not offended by the name.^[5] The use of public opinion polling methods to measure the opinions of a small, diverse population was criticized by scholars, in particular the use of self-identification to select the individuals surveyed.^[6] The name was opposed by the National Congress of American Indians, which said in 2013 that it represented 1.2 million people in its member tribes.