At first glance, the Washington Commanders' announcement of repurposing the site of the old RFK Stadium for a new field was widely celebrated around the league.
RFK Stadium was synonymous with a successful Commanders team that won three Super Bowl titles and went to five title games in its 30-year history. Plenty of Hall-of-Famers called the historic site home.
Not everyone is pleased with the fact that Washington is moving back to their old stomping grounds, though.
Speaking on his latest Pro Football Talk show, Mike Florio made it clear that the team moving back to D.C. isn't in the best interest of the taxpayer.
"It's a political game bringing in John Riggins and Joe Gibbs," Florio said. "It's all a political game, and it's all a show aimed at getting people behind the project and aimed at shouting down those who would be opposed to it.
"I've got a statement from the D.C. Mayor's office, and the headline is, ‘$2.7 billion investment from the Commanders is the single largest private investment in District history,’ in bold and big letters at the top—because that's how you get people to not notice the taxpayer money that's going to be added to it, right?”
It is true that D.C. will be paying for roughly $1 billion as part of that deal for a new stadium. However, Florio's comments are made without understanding the full picture.
The residents of the D.C. area get to vote on the people who bring in the higher taxes because of a stadium like this. They voted in favor of the politicians and policies that allowed the Commanders to come home.
Whether they knew about the ramifications is irrelevant. They still voted for it. And now they will be footing the bill, whether people outside the area agree or not.
