City of Kansas City fires employee involved in Harrison Butker social media post
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The City of Kansas City has "separated" from the employee involved in the social media post last week who shared where Harrison Butker lives, according to Mayor Quinton Lucas on 95.7 FM.
The city tells FOX4 the employee violated policy by posting outside the scope of authorized city communications.
This comes after the city posted on X just after 7:40 p.m. on May 15, saying, “Just a reminder that Harrison Butker lives in the City of Lee’s Summit.” The post came following backlash from Butker’s commencement speech at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas.
The city later deleted the post and responded just after 8:20 p.m. with a typo saying “We apologies for our previous tweet. It was shared in error.”
The city did not identify the employee who made the post and said it won't have any further comment.
The post about Butker came after the Chiefs kicker made a graduation speech at Benedictine College that some found offensive to women in the workforce and the LGBTQ community. The 20-minute speech sparked emotion from millions on social media.
The speech helped Butker’s merchandise rise to the top in the NFL shop for Chiefs. He also received support from the women of the Hunt family who own the Chiefs. Star pass rusher Chris Jones also came to his defense.
The founding sisters of Benedictine, Benedictine Sisters of Mount St. Scholastica denounced Butker’s comments and a petition began for the Chiefs to release Butker that has garnered more than 220,000 signatures.
The NFL released a statement through Jonathan Beane, its Chief Diversity & Inclusion Officer on May 15, and Commissioner Roger Goodell spoke about Butker on Wednesday.
Reid reiterated Goodell’s points that allowing players to voice their opinions makes America great. Reid said he still expects Butker to make the trip to the White House with the Chiefs to celebrate their Super Bowl. That trip is scheduled for the end of the month.
Mahomes defended Butker’s character on Wednesday by saying that he is a good person that he sees all the time.
“I judge him by the character that he shows every single day, and that’s a good person as someone who cares about the people around him, cares about his family, wants to make a good impact in society," Mahomes said.
There's a resolution before Kansas City Council on Thursday that would request a formal apology to Butker. FOX4 will follow developments in City Hall and update this story with more information as it's available.