San Francisco 49ers defensive end Nick Bosa stirred up quite the controversy after his team’s Week 8 win against the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday Night Football.

The star player crashed his teammate’s postgame interview with NBC’s Melissa Stark to display a “Make America Great Again” hat just over a week before the presidential election. The statement was a clear violation of NFL rules in which players are “prohibited from wearing, displaying, or otherwise conveying personal messages either in writing or illustration,” when they are visible on a television broadcast.

As is normally the case in such violations, the NFL was expected to issue Bosa a fine. Except nearly two weeks passed with no official announcement. Saturday, it was finally reported that Bosa would be fined $11,255 for violating the NFL’s policy — a price he said “was well worth it.” Normally in these situations, the NFL issues fines in a matter of days.

Now, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that the NFL deliberately waited until after the election had passed before issuing Bosa’s fine in fear of retribution from now President-elect Donald Trump.

“The timing of Bosa’s gesture placed the league into a thorny situation. Any punishment could have been perceived as a statement against Trump during the final days of the presidential race, even though wearing a message in support of Vice President Kamala Harris would also have been against the rules,” Andrew Beaton of the Wall Street Journal reports.

In context, the decision to delay Bosa’s fine seems like a prudent business decision from the NFL, albeit one that creates a perception that not all speech is treated equally. Of course in 2016 and 2017, when some NFL players protested racial injustice by kneeling during the national anthem, Trump was vocal about his displeasure with the league, which influenced how the NFL changed its anthem policies.

But Bosa’s delayed fine shows the NFL is willing to put its bottom line over adjudicating its own rules fairly. It’s understandable that the NFL didn’t want to put itself in the center of a political controversy just days before the election, though it shows the league is mindful that one side of the political aisle has a recent history of taking minor social issues and turning them into widespread protests and boycotts. See: Bud Light. Would the NFL would have waited weeks before dolling out a fine for pro-Kamala Harris messaging?

Nevertheless, 2016 and 2017 proved that the NFL is pretty resilient to social movements, rebounding from a short ratings lull to become the viewership behemoth it is today. But in its handling of the Bosa situation, a double standard has been revealed — albeit a minor one. Bosa still received his fine, just later than normal.

It’s a small reputational hit the NFL is willing to take to minimize the downside risk that would’ve come from fining Bosa before the election. And it’s hard to blame the league for avoiding that powderkeg.

[Wall Street Journal]