Tom Brady's done with football. Could politics be next?

(Image credit: Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

published 1 February 2022

Tom Brady has officially retired from the NFL. So, what's next? Judging from his previous statements, the answer to that question could be "politics."

In 2004, Brady told ESPN magazine it was his "craziest ambition" to one day be a United States senator. After he made that statement, an investigation found that the then-26-year-old Brady had never voted.

Brady reiterated his interest in seeking political office during a 2005 interview with CBS' 60 Minutes.

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The former New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback has not referred to that particular aspiration lately, but he has not shied away from making political statements either. In the leadup to the 2016 election, CNN reported, Brady displayed a Make America Great Again hat in his locker.

In 2020, Brady said in an interview with Howard Stern that Trump's political career made him "uncomfortable" and that "political support is totally different than the support of a friend."

Shortly after winning his seventh and final Super Bowl, Brady joked with the newly inaugurated President Biden about former President Donald Trump's stolen election claims.

In May 2021, writer Drew Magary predicted that, after retiring, Brady would not run for office, but instead "will become one of those dudes who loves being ASKED to run for public office but never actually does. This has been a whole genre of celebrity for decades now."

Brady would not be the first to make the transition from football to politics. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) won his Senate seat in 2020 after working as a Division I college football head coach for over 20 years.

Rep. Jon Runyan (R-N.J.) was an NFL offensive lineman from 1996 to 2009 before winning his first term in the House of Representatives in 2010, according to ABC News.

After an unsuccessful career as an NFL quarterback, Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) served three terms in the House before leaving Congress in 2013.

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Grayson Quay was the weekend editor at TheWeek.com. His writing has also been published in National Review, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Modern Age, The American Conservative, The Spectator World, and other outlets. Grayson earned his M.A. from Georgetown University in 2019.