Enes Kanter Freedom has declared his support for Donald Trump – 18 months after bashing the president-elect’s ally Elon Musk over his own ban from X.
Kanter Freedom, who in 2017 called Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan the ‘Hitler of our century,’ said he was banned from the platform last year at the behest of the Turkish government before the country’s elections. He later told CNN that Musk was ‘bowing down to a dictatorship.’
And while Musk has since been tapped to co-lead a government efficiency commission for Trump, the ex-NBA big man is backing the 78-year-old as he posted a video of the pair meeting at a recent gala.
In the undated clip, posted to X on Friday, Kanter Freedom and Trump shake hands before posing for a picture, with the incoming president thanking the athlete for his support.
He can later be heard calling the Turkish-born player ‘fantastic’ in the video.
Enes Kanter Freedom and president-elect Donald Trump shook hands at a recent gala
Kanter Freedom previously accused Trump ally Elon Musk of ‘bowing down to a dictatorship’
Mail Sport has reached out to Kanter’s manager for comment regarding Trump and Musk’s newly-formed political relationship.
Kanter Freedom wrote on X, ‘Had an amazing meeting with the President of the United States of America. I look forward to working with you.’
It’s unclear if the 11-year NBA vet, who last played in the league in 2022, will actually have any sort of role with the Trump administration.
Kanter Freedom has been an extremely vocal critic of Turkey’s President Erdogan, and the country revoked his passport and imprisoned his father on terrorism charges for seven years.
The country even placed a $500,000 bounty on Kanter Freedom’s head, he wrote for The Atlantic.
Though he is not currently banned from X, he railed against Musk after he was briefly removed from the platform last year ahead of Turkey’s elections.
‘What he’s doing in America, nobody can say anything about it,’ Freedom Kanter admitted on OutKick’s Don’t @ Me with Dan Dakich. ‘The Turkish government reached out to him and said, ban him immediately. So not only me, he banned a couple other journalists, too.
‘And this is like the most critical time in maybe Turkish history because there are elections and there is literally a dictatorship going against a guy who’s secular, going for democracy.
‘So, right before the election, Turkish government reached out to Iran and said, ban this, this and that guy and you did it. I had to call them out, man, because it just what he’s doing is just not right.’
The Turkish-born center added ‘Freedom’ to his name when he became a US citizen in 2021
Kanter Freedom has been an extremely vocal critic of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan
‘He even tweeted and said, “Would you rather want me to ban only like few guys and or you just rather let them ban the whole app in a country?” They’re bluffing. They’re not going to ban the whole app in Turkey. But Elon thinks like a businessman. Obviously, he wants to make a lot of money from Turkey and stuff. So it’s just sad to see. But I had to call him out on that one.’
Kanter was even previously critical of Trump at one point.
In a 2016 interview with Sports Illustrated, he was asked what historical figure he’d want to have dinner with.
‘I need to think about that one,’ he said. ‘Probably Trump. Can I say that? Yeah, I would ask him, ‘What’s wrong with you, man?’ Yeah, probably Trump to try to see what’s his problem.’
The basketball player, who averaged 11.2 points per game in his career, added ‘Freedom’ to the end of his name when he became a US citizen in 2021.
However, he has fallen out of the NBA, which he has claimed is the result of his political attacks on China.
He has criticized Michael Jordan and LeBron James for their business ties to Nike and, by extension, China — a country accused of targeting its minority Uighur population and forcing citizens into slave labor camps.
The US State Department estimates that, since 2017, as many as two million Uighurs and other ethnic minorities have been detained in internment camps in China. The country has denied human rights violations and claims the camps are intended to prevent terrorism among the Uighurs, who are predominantly Muslim.
