Abortion rights, women of color, and LGBTQIA+ people are under attack. Pledge to join us in fighting for gender justice.
The NFL’s Decision to Not Release Final Investigation Report About Sexual Harassment Allegations Against the Washington Football Team Reveals a Lack of Transparency
(Washington, D.C.) After conducting a yearlong investigation into sexual harassment allegations against the managers and executives of the Washington Football Team (WFT), the National Football League (NFL) fined the team $10 million dollars but did not release the investigation’s findings. In February 2021, the National Women’s Law Center—along with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Futures Without Violence, and TIME’S UP Foundation—wrote a letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell urging him to release the investigation’s report into the sexual harassment allegations by more than 40 current and former employees of the WFT. The TIME’S UP Legal Defense Fund supported the legal representation of the survivors who alleged they had been sexually harassed on the job by the management of the WFT.
The following is a statement by Sharyn Tejani, Director of the TIME’S UP Legal Defense Fund:
“The yearlong investigation of the Washington Football Team and the $10 million fine lodged against it yesterday by the National Football League would never have happened without the many brave survivors who came forward at great personal risk to tell their stories of sexual abuse, bullying, and retaliation that they experienced when working for the team. The information that was made public revealed a rampant and brazen culture of abuse that the team’s management supported and condoned for years—but we never got the full story. Given what we do know, the National Football League’s decision not to release any findings from the investigation is alarming: without full transparency, there can be no true accountability. Similarly, the paltry amount of the fine, when compared to the wealth of the team and its owner, is shocking. It should be no surprise that recent statements by the team’s owner, Daniel Snyder, promising to end the team’s culture of abuse, ring hollow.”