More than a dozen professional teams are interested in allowing their arenas to be voting centers this fall — adding to the growing list of ways civic engagement has taken new forms during the pandemic.
The stadiums, which can hold tens of thousands of fans, have sat mostly empty since the Covid-19 outbreak brought pro sports to a halt five months ago. In November, though, they could provide enough room for poll workers to space out a large number of ballot stations and socially distance voters while reducing wait times.
The initiative comes as election officials across the country try to make in-person voting safe and mail-in voting accessible while President Trump continues to cast doubt on the security of what could be a majority vote-by-mail election.
Dubbed the Election Super Centers Project, the multi-league effort was announced last week by the National Vote at Home Institute, which normally promotes casting ballots through the mail, and the Silver Linings Group, a group of public policy experts formed this spring to mull solutions for problems the pandemic has brought to light.
But the teams, which include the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers and NBA's Milwaukee Bucks in the swing states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, are still ironing out the details with the local authorities as they discuss plans to open for early voting and registration.
Other teams already on board are baseball's Boston Red Sox; the NHL's Washington Capitals and New Jersey Devils (who play in Newark); and the NBA's Los Angeles Clippers, Indiana Pacers (Indianapolis), Golden State Warriors (San Francisco) and Washington Wizards (who share the Capital One Arena and an owner with the Capitals).
The effort hopes to expand to include up to 25 teams and arenas, and discussions are starting with some colleges regarding use of their venues.
Inspired by an effort in Kentucky's June primary — when polling centers in Louisville's convention center and a sports venue in Lexington helped poll workersspace out voting booths and reduce wait times — the organizers of the effort say that turning arenas into voting "super centers" could increase in-person turnout this fall by more than 1 milllion.
"The cornerstone of being an American is the sanctity of your vote," said Eugene Jarecki, the filmmaker and author who helped found the Silver Linings Project. "When you have a physical emergency like a flood or a fire, very often you see buildings like the Superdome used. The same is true here. We have a democratic emergency under the threat of the virus."
Jarecki said last month's announcement from basketball superstar LeBron James's More Than a Vote that the Detroit Pistons and Atlanta Hawks would open their NBA arenas as polling places also proved the idea's viability.
While Jarecki said the group strongly supports voting by mail, the project wants to give voters all options.
To meet the goal of adding 25 teams, the project has convened experts and influencers like Jared Dearing, the election official who organized Kentucky's use of super centers, and recording artist John Legend and NBA coach Doc Rivers, both of whom have been outspoken advocates of expanding voting.
"I can't imagine a more important thing at this very moment for Americans," Jarecki said.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.