Meet the Former Pro Athletes Running for Congress

(Right) Austin Theriault, driver of the #51 Jacob Companies Chevrolet in Richmond, Va., on Sept. 20, 2019. (Center) Republican Senate candidate Steve Garvey, in Palm Desert, Calif., on March 5, 2024. (Left) Royce White #30 of the Power reacts in Frisco, Texas on Aug. 6, 2022.Jared C. Tilton, Mario Tama/Getty Images; Alex Bierens de Haan/Getty Images for BIG3

Politics is known to be a sport and this year is no exception.

Three former professional athletes have thrown their hat into the ring to run for Congress in the Nov. 5 election.

Steve Garvey is the Republican nominee in California for Senate, facing Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). Polls show the latter, who has been in the House since 2001, up by double digits.

Garvey, 75, played for the Los Angeles Dodgers between 1969 and 1982 and the San Diego Padres between 1983 and 1987. He was a 10-time All-Star and won the World Series in 1981. He was the National League MVP in 1974, the National League Championship Series MVP in 1978 and 1984, and won the Gold Glove Award in four consecutive years.

An Emerson College poll this month shows Schiff leading Garvey, 56 percent to 33 percent, with 11 percent undecided. A poll late last month showed Schiff up with 63 percent of the vote.

A detailed platform page on his campaign website shows Garvey focusing on issues including securing the border, implementing fiscal discipline, standing with law enforcement, and reforming the education system.

Schiff, on the other hand, is running on ending gerrymandering, abolishing the filibuster, abolishing the electoral college, implementing judicial reform such as expanding the Supreme Court, taking on price gouging, and passing the Green New Deal.

Former President Donald Trump, the GOP presidential nominee, has said that Garvey, whom he said he doesn’t know, has “no chance” of winning if he doesn’t “reach out to MAGA,” Trump’s Make America Great Again movement.

Garvey has gone after Schiff for being a “career politician.”

“This man hasn’t done anything over the last 24 years on any of these things that have given us any consistency in life,” said Garvey during an Oct. 8 debate.

His opponent has gone after him for having no political experience.

“While Mr. Garvey was signing baseballs for the last 37 years, I was seeing presidents of both parties and governors of both parties sign my bills into law,” Schiff said.

In the Minnesota Senate race, former NBA player Royce White, a Republican, faces incumbent Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.).

White, 33, was drafted by the Houston Rockets with the 16th pick in the 2012 NBA Draft. He played in the NBA Developmental League and did not see an NBA court until he was with the Sacramento Kings in 2014, his final year in the league. White played the rest of his professional career in Canada. White was known for his fear of flying.

White, who has come under fire over accusations of making anti-Semitic remarks, won the Aug. 13 primary with 38.6 percent of the vote as he was endorsed by the Minnesota GOP.

White is a populist who unsuccessfully ran for the House in 2022. His platform includes term limits for House and Senate members, election integrity, and a year of paying no taxes.

As of 2022, incumbent Klobuchar has voted in line with President Joe Biden’s positions 98 percent of the time.

In a poll this month, Klobuchar, who has been in the Senate since 2007, leads White by just 7 percentage points, 42 percent to 35 percent. That margin is a 1 percentage point decrease from a poll taken by the same pollster between Sept. 27 and Oct. 2 that showed Klobuchar leading White, 46 percent to 38 percent. The latest poll, conducted by Redfield & Wilton Strategies, was taken from Oct. 12 to 14.

While Garvey and White are expected to lose, one former athlete with a decent shot of winning is former NASCAR driver Austin Theriault. He is the GOP nominee facing incumbent Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District, which is a swing district.

Theriault, who has been a member of the Maine House of Representatives since 2022, did not win any NASCAR races as his best finish in the Cup Series was 35th, 40th in the Xfinity Series, and 24th in the Craftsman Truck Series. He last competed in NASCAR in 2019. He won the 2017 ARCA Racing Series Championship.

A poll last month showed the 30-year-old leading Golden 47 percent to 44 percent. Golden has been in Congress since 2019.

Theriault, who has been endorsed by Trump, has come out against cutting Social Security and Medicare, according to an article on his campaign website. He does not have a platform on the website.

Theriault also supports tariffs, though he said those should be measured.

His main pitch is that he is someone above the political fray.

“We need more balance and less extremism in Washington. I’m somebody that can go down there and get the job done. I want to advocate for everybody, regardless of if you’re independent or Democrat,” he said during an Oct. 3 debate.

In the debate, Theriault went after Golden—one of a few congressional Democrats to not endorse Democrat presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris—for voting for the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act.

Golden, 42, highlighted on his campaign website his campaign finance reform and anti-corruption efforts during his time in Congress.

Formerly served as a U.S. Marine in Iraq and Afghanistan, Golden promised to push for improving services for veterans, expanding health care coverage, increasing social security benefits for seniors, growing Maine’s shipbuilding workforce, and securing the border, according to his website.

A number of other former athletes have moved into politics over the years.

Former President Gerald Ford played football at the University of Michigan. John Runyan, who was an NFL offensive lineman, represented New Jersey’s 3rd Congressional District between 2011 and 2015. Jack Kemp was an NFL quarterback, most notably for the Buffalo Bills, before serving in Congress for 18 years and being Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. Kemp was the late Sen. Bob Dole’s running mate in the 1996 presidential election, which former President Bill Clinton easily won.