'Until All Are Free': Drue Tranquill's Mission Beyond Football

Early in a conversation with Drue Tranquill, there's a moment when the football stops mattering. 

Not because he does not love it — he clearly does — but because you start to realize that the way he talks about defending people who cannot defend themselves sounds exactly the same whether he is describing what he does on a football field or what he is trying to do about one of the most pressing humanitarian crises on the planet.

"As a defense, we're attacking the opposing offense," Tranquill said. "And when you think about these vulnerable people around the world who are trapped in these horrible situations, you can only imagine the psychology of that person, just hoping. Like you pray they have hope. Hoping for somebody to step in and rescue them. And IJM (International Justice Mission) has stepped up and said, 'Send us.'"

This season, Tranquill and the Kansas City Chiefs linebacker room are answering that same call. Beginning Monday night against the Denver Broncos, Tranquill and his wife Jackie are pledging $1,000 to the International Justice Mission for every tackle he records in the 2026 season.

He is not doing it alone. Cooper McDonald, Jack Cochrane, Jeff Bassa, Cole Christianson, and Cam Jones are all making their own pledges. Nick Bolton, who has a separate charitable initiative of his own this season, has committed to helping champion the cause and raise awareness. The entire linebacker room, in some capacity, is in.

"There's not a single guy who's not in some capacity touching this deal," Tranquill said. "It's not just like a one-man show. We're going to collectively champion this throughout the season."

For Tranquill, though, this is not a charity exercise. It reflects a belief he holds deeply: that the platform professional athletes carry was not given to them solely for football. It was given to them to do good in the world, and he takes that responsibility seriously. 

He is moved by the passage of the Renewed Hope Act, which allocates $100 million for Congress to employ tactical teams to investigate and combat the online exploitation of children. 

He is moved by the scale of the problem, over 50 million people currently trapped in trafficking and slavery worldwide, and by the escalating nature of it as technology makes exploitation easier and harder to trace. 

"I don't believe that God gave me a platform just for my football skills," he said. "God gave me a platform to use my athletic talents to do good in the world. And this is the way we're realizing that and doing it."

What IJM does

The International Justice Mission is the world's largest anti-trafficking organization, operating across 33 offices in 19 countries. What sets it apart from most humanitarian organizations is that it does not just respond to the aftermath of violence. It goes after the perpetrators.

Mark Herzlich, IJM's Director of Pro Athlete Partnerships and a former Super Bowl champion who played linebacker for the New York Giants, described it this way: "This is the one NGO (non-governmental organization) out there that is solving the problem of violence against the poor. There are a lot of organizations that do really great things, like building wells and building schools and providing resources for those in need. But no one else fights against the problem of violence and is actively putting bad guys in jail while reforming the justice system, like IJM is doing."

IJM's investigators work alongside local law enforcement to identify the prevalence of trafficking, build cases, plan rescue operations, and then remain present after the rescue to provide shelters, social workers, and trauma-informed care for survivors. 

The goal is not just to rescue individuals but to change systems. In nine jurisdictions where IJM has completed its work and exited, local governments have sustained reductions in the targeted crimes. 

Three months before this conversation took place, IJM helped rescue hundreds of people from captivity in India in a single operation. Two weeks before it, another 180 people in bondage labor were pulled from a brick kiln.

"The pictures after these rescues are little kids," Herzlich said. "Three- and four-year-olds that have never lived in any context besides being enslaved. And now they're going to get the first glimpse, the first taste of what freedom even feels like."

The two primary geographic focuses are India, where an estimated 12 million people are currently enslaved in bonded labor, and the Philippines, where online sexual exploitation of children has proliferated through internet access and deep poverty. 

IJM investigators work with the FBI to identify IP addresses in the United States and coordinate with field workers in the Philippines to locate children being abused in their own homes, often by family members, for paying customers predominantly in America and Europe. 

Tranquill takes deep offense to these operations happening in our own backyard, saying the United States is the number one consumer of online exploitation.

"These kids need to be rescued," Tranquill said. "We've got to give them hope, man."

How it came together

Tranquill's path to this campaign began, as he describes it, with a stirring. He and Jackie had carried a hunger for justice for some time, with freedom at the forefront of their faith life. During training camp in St. Joseph this summer, it began to crystallize into something more concrete.

"I really felt it was just stirring inside me," he said. "This thirst for justice. This thirst to see people free around the world around this specific issue."

He started thinking about the power of multiplication, of what it would look like to galvanize an entire position room around a single cause and present one collective check at the end of the season. He reached out to a friend who handles digital campaigns to start sketching out what that might look like. 

Then Jackie found it first.

"She was like, 'Drew, IJM is running a Freedom to Play campaign right now,'" Tranquill recalled. "And I was like, 'Really?' I looked into it, and I was like, I'm not going to recreate the wheel. They're literally already doing it."

The campaign takes its name from a simple but devastating contrast. Growing up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Tranquill could throw a football in the backyard, shoot hoops in the driveway, play baseball on a summer afternoon. He never had to question whether he had the freedom to do those things.

For millions of children around the world currently trapped in slavery, that freedom does not exist. They are not playing. They are working in brick kilns in India, trapped in bonded labor passed down through generations, or they are being exploited online in the Philippines, with their childhoods stolen by the very people who were supposed to protect them. 

The Freedom to Play campaign is a call to awareness and to action, rooted in the belief that every child deserves what Tranquill and so many others took for granted.

He reached out to IJM's Team Freedom liaison, and within a few weeks, the campaign had taken shape. Team Freedom is IJM's pro athlete partner network, a community that spans the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, and US Soccer, and has raised over $25 million for IJM's work since its launch. 

Hunter Henry of the New England Patriots and his wife, Parker, have been major partners. Drake May has been involved. Kirk Cousins has supported IJM for the better part of a decade. Former Chiefs fullback Anthony Sherman takes part in the movement, too. The network is growing, and the Chiefs linebacker room is the latest chapter.

The math behind the campaign is striking. IJM estimates the all-in cost of identifying, rescuing, and restoring one victim at approximately $8,800 per child saved. Tranquill has averaged over 95 tackles per season in every healthy year of his career. He is not just writing a check. He is building a ticker that Chiefs Kingdom can watch in real time and join him in.

Tranquill says that he does not think people talk about this issue enough, mostly because they do not want to think about it. Because why would you? These are heinous acts of violence, in the linebacker’s words. The Super Bowl Champion believes that if people really knew, everyone would sign up to pay $8,800 to save someone’s life. 

"They can do a one-time donation, or they could say, 'Hey, I'd love to partner with you and do a dollar for every tackle you make, or $10, or $100,'" Tranquill said. "Whatever season of life people are in, they can hop in in the smallest or largest capacity. And at the end of the day, all of it is going toward identifying and rescuing these victims."

Local businesses are already coming aboard. Purple Label Barber Shop in Kansas City will post the campaign in their shop with QR codes for easy access. Others are expected to follow. My Cause My Cleats later this season will give the campaign another moment of visibility for Tranquill, and perhaps the rest of the linebackers.

The man behind Team Freedom, and a connection nobody planned

Mark Herzlich knows how to use a platform for something bigger than football. He played linebacker in the NFL for seven years before joining IJM full-time five years ago to build out its pro athlete program, Team Freedom. He came to the organization the same way most athletes do: through a conference, a survivor's story, and a moment that wouldn't let him go.

It was 2014. Herzlich and his wife were at an NFL conference in California when a survivor of human trafficking took the stage and shared her story. They turned to each other and knew. They have been involved with IJM in one form or another ever since.

The numbers behind IJM's work are staggering. Since its founding in 1997, the organization has helped bring 490,000 victims to safety, secure convictions for more than 8,400 perpetrators, and train more than 413,000 justice officials and community leaders worldwide. But Herzlich quickly points out that the statistics, as powerful as they are, do not capture what makes IJM different.

"What makes the real difference is the systemic changes that happen at the justice system level," he said. "In nine jurisdictions where we've exited after being there for almost 20 years, we've seen anywhere from a 50 to 85 percent reduction in the type of crime we were fighting, sustained by the local justice system. We're not just rescuing one-offs. We're really changing entire towns and cities to have violence handled correctly by local law enforcement."

The scale of IJM's operations is significant. Large-scale rescue missions are a core part of the work, including a raid that freed 450 people from captivity in India in a single operation just months before this story was published. But Herzlich is equally proud of what happens on the other end of the spectrum.

"Just like the shepherd left the 99 to find the one, we do that all the time too," he said. "There will be full-scale operations for an individual child. Absolutely."

After survivors are rescued, IJM does not simply hand them off. Shelters are identified before raids take place. Social workers accompany law enforcement on rescue missions. Trauma-informed therapists work with survivors to help them reintegrate into society and, where possible, reunite with family.

The network has collectively raised over $25 million for IJM's work and brought its mission before hundreds of millions of people through the unique reach professional athletes bring.

There is a connection woven through this story that neither Herzlich nor Tranquill fully planned to mention, but both did. Before ending his conversation with Chiefs OnSI, Herzlich noted that he played linebacker for the New York Giants under defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo.

"Spagnuolo definitely fostered this spirit in me," Herzlich said. "He's a strong Christian as well, and he brings this kind of 'your platform is bigger than just the game' to his defenses. His influence over my life is one of the reasons why I thought bigger than just my one town or my one city."

When Tranquill was asked about the same coach, now his own defensive coordinator in Kansas City, he did not hesitate.

"Spags inspires all of his players to be great in every aspect of their life," Tranquill said. "It's not just football. He challenges us in our personal discipline, our time as fathers and as husbands, and certainly as ambassadors to champion great causes in our communities. He's definitely a fatherly figure in that way. He's a great man."

Spagnuolo is not a direct catalyst for the Freedom to Play campaign, but two men, separated by decades, both linebackers, both shaped by the same coach, now connected through a movement to fight for people who cannot fight for themselves.

Rooted in Kansas City

Tranquill came to Kansas City as a free agent four years ago and has made it home in every sense of the word. He grew up in the Midwest and, after starting his career in Los Angeles, California, found something that felt like home in Kansas City, admitting that it is in the cards for his family to stay here after his career ends. 

His fourth child, a son named Shepherd Freedom Tranquill, was born here. The family has built roots in the city through Super Bowl rings, friendships, and a genuine investment in the community that extends well beyond football.

Through a partnership with Minsky's Pizza and a fundraising effort under the banner of Operation Breakthrough, Tranquill helped fund the renovation of an outdoor play space at a downtown Kansas City organization, serving children and families experiencing poverty. 

The project, called Zone 23, added new concrete, basketball courts, pickleball courts, a life-size chess set, something Tranquill is famously good at dating back to his time at Notre Dame, to what was previously an underutilized space. The long-term vision is a full sports complex for the kids and teens the organization serves.

"There's just a lot of ways that Kansas City is at work in the community on issues," Tranquill said. "Chiefs Kingdom is real. Not every fan base has it. And to have a fan base who not only loves what their team is doing on the field, but gets behind it off the field as well. It's cool to see the impact that creates."

A call to action

The Freedom to Play campaign launches Monday, September 14, the same day the Chiefs open their season against the Denver Broncos on Monday Night Football. The donation link will go live, the launch will roll out across social channels, and Drue Tranquill will jog onto the field at Arrowhead Stadium with something more than a football game on his mind.

"Every single tackle is gaining momentum," he said. "I just feel like there's some momentum going here. You look at the Renewed Hope Act that just got passed in Congress, where $100 million is going to identify and rescue these kids. You see organizations like IJM collaborating across the globe to work against this issue. It feels like there's momentum towards freedom. And we just want to get behind it. We want to tackle this issue, man, until all are free."

For Chiefs Kingdom, getting involved is simple. A one-time donation, a per-tackle pledge, or simply spreading the word. Every dollar, in Tranquill's framing, represents something more than a number.

"Who wouldn't give $8,800 to see a child rescued from the bondage of sex trafficking or human trafficking or slave labor?" he said. "It's like we all, in our being, want to get behind that. So we're excited just to champion the cause and invite people into it. Come partner with us. Let's get a lot of tackles, let's get a lot of wins along the way, but let's raise some awareness to the real issues going on."

To learn more about the International Justice Mission and the Freedom to Play campaign, visit ijm.org. To make a one-time donation or per-tackle pledge in support of Drue Tranquill and the Chiefs linebacker room's campaign, visit the link in Tranquill's social media bio starting Monday, September 14.