Elementary students kneel for national anthem performance before Mariners game

During their elementary school choir’s performance of the national anthem before a game between the Seattle Mariners and Cleveland Indians at Safeco Field on Easter Sunday, two students kneeled.

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The students got the attention of former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who retweeted a photo of the students kneeling shared by Tacoma news Tribune reporter Ryan S. Clark.

Kaepernick is credited with starting a movement in support of racial equality and social justice by kneeling during “The Star-Spangled Banner” before games during the 2016 season, his last in the NFL.

Video of the elementary school students kneeling also made it to Twitter:

Kaepernick’s movement caught on across the sports world and crossed over into national politics, earning him GQ magazine’s Citizen of the Year honor and making him a finalist for Time’s Person of the Year award. Oakland Athletics catcher Bruce Maxwell, the son of a U.S. Army veteran, was the first baseball player to protest inequality and injustice during the national anthem this past September.

A handful of recording artists have kneeled during their national anthem performances at NFL and NBA games over the past year. Likewise, youth athletes have kneeled before games. But the two young girls who kneeled during their performance at Sunday’s Mariners game are trailblazers, demonstrating that the quest for racial equality and social justice has support from a new generation.

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Ben Rohrbach is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at rohrbach_ben@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @brohrbach

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