Anti-establishment Republican and former NBA player Royce White lost his bid for a U.S. Senate seat Tuesday after falling to incumbent Democrat Sen. Amy Klobuchar in Minnesota’s top election matchup.
White had acknowledged he was as surprised as anyone when the state Republican Party endorsed him in May, but the self-described populist went on to get a plurality in the August primary against a more conventional Republican, Navy veteran Joe Fraser.
White was a first-round pick by the Houston Rockets in 2012 but never played for the team after disclosing mental health issues and saying he did not want to fly to road games with the team. He signed multiple 10-day contacts with the Sacramento Kings in 2013, playing in three games, but was eventually let go before playing overseas for several years.
The 33-year-old White, who was an outspoken advocate for mental health awareness in sports, also considered a future in mixed martial arts but lost his only professional fight in 2021.
White has made a number of social media comments that have been denounced as derogatory. White, who ran and lost in the GOP primary for a U.S. House seat in 2022, argued that, as a Black candidate, he could broaden the party’s base by appealing to voters of color in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area and others disillusioned with establishment politics.
He entered the race as a decided underdog to Klobuchar, whose victory of a fourth term sets Minnesota’s record for the most consecutive wins by a Democratic senator since the state began directly electing senators in 1918, according to Eric Ostermeier, curator of the Minnesota Historical Election Archive at the University of Minnesota.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.