WNBA Documentary ‘Power of the Dream’ Connects 2020 and 2024 Elections Through Player Activism

The WNBA was, as they say, in its bag (their Birkin bag) this year. Viewership this season was astronomical, the rookies were incendiary, and the vets were relentless in their dominance — much to the delight of fans across the United States. But the league has always been a hub of political activism and good ball, something that was especially evident ahead of the 2020 election, a period that is the focus of the Dawn Porter-directed documentary “The Power of the Dream.”

The documentary features former and current WNBA stars and legends like Angel McCoughtry, Sue Bird, and Nneka Ogwumike and was produced by Porter, Bird, Ogwumike, and Tracee Ellis Ross. It was also produced by Industrial Media, Trilogy Films, Joy Mill Entertainment, and Togethxr.

The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020 threw the WNBA season – and the world — into chaos. The deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd inspired an uprising in activism and protest across the country, “a social justice upheaval that was long overdue and incredibly necessary,” said Togethxr co-founder Jessica Robertson.

Like the NBA, the WNBA opted to play its season in a bubble. “So you have an entire league, 144 women, grappling with whether or not they want to play at all,” Robertson added. Some players opted out of the season and focused on social justice and the burgeoning Black Lives Matter movement, she added, which posed a question to the league as a whole.

“How can you as a league — as 144 women who represent the very culture you’re fighting for and trying to move forward — how can you play a season that is both safe in the pandemic, provides fans a connection in the pandemic, but also stands for something that’s bigger than themselves?” Robertson continued.

“And by the way, it’s an election year.” No big deal.

The decision to release the documentary and take it on tour in 2024, four years after the events depicted took place and four months after its June release, was intentional. Like this year’s election, the 2020 cycle was fraught with tension. President Biden faced off against Donald Trump, and the state of Georgia played a crucial role in the Democratic Party’s win.

Georgia is also a key topic in “Power of the Dream” — particularly the state’s Senate race between former Senator and former Atlanta Dream co-owner Kelly Loeffler and the Rev. Raphael Warnock, who challenged her seat. In response to reports that the WNBA — a league that is at least 60% Black — planned to paint the words “Black Lives Matter” on their courts in the bubble, Loeffler fired off a letter to the league’s Commissioner Cathy Engelbert in which she panned the idea.

In an interview with Fox News the next day, Loeffler described Black Lives Matter as “Marxist.” The response from the athletes in the WNBA was swift. On Aug. 4 players from the Dream and the Phoenix Mercury wore black shirts that read “Vote Warnock” before their game. The shirts spread league-wide, which prompted the question: who is Warnock, and why should anyone vote for him?

The league’s advocacy for Warnock and a Senate race in Georgia brought about a significant and necessary change, Robertson said. “Reverend Warnock played a crucial role in flipping that Georgia Senate seat which gave us the Senate, turned the Senate blue, and saved democracy at least for the next four years.”

The tie to 2024 is strong, she added. “Let’s pretend for a second that Kamala Harris becomes the first woman president — the first woman of color president in the history of the United States,” Robertson said, “The person that will swear her in on January 20, 2025, is Katanji Brown Jackson.”

“Katanji Brown Jackson has her seat because of the Senate that was flipped and the decision that was made to put her onto the highest court in the land. That doesn’t happen without the WNBA standing up and pushing for the election of Raphael Warnock.”

McCoughtry, who was the number one draft pick in 2009 when she was selected by the Atlanta Dream, said of the time period, “It just felt like it was our time to use our platform. You know, people were like, ‘Oh, we shouldn’t play. But I’m like, you always play – racism didn’t just start right this year — use the platform.” To that end, McCoughtry was true to her word.

The stretch of time between 2020 and 2024 is “so connected and so tied,” Robertson also said, “which also just speaks to the power and to activism as we know it to be, which is Black women move our culture forward. They know how to organize. They know how to mobilize, and they do the work.”

This was evident in the WNBA then and is evident now, she added, as the player’s union enters renegotiations for its Collective Bargaining Agreement ahead of a landmark $2.2 billion media rights deal that goes into effect in 2026.

“It’s incumbent on us as a media company to tell these types of stories because for too long, these female athletes and their power within culture has been marginalized,” Roberton concluded. “So we want to take these stories, pull them from the margins, make them front and center, and make them resonate because this is as much a story about politics as it’s a story about power, and how powerful these women actually are.”

October’s tour dates for “Power of the Dream” included Chicago, Boston, and Providence; upcoming tour stops are in Uncasville, CT; Washington, D.C.; Ann Arbor, MI; Atlanta, GA; and New York City.

The documentary is currently available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.

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