At the Royal Rumble press conference on Saturday night, Paul Levesque stated of WWE, “We just had an amazing week.”
Anyone who read the lawsuit filed by former WWE employee Janel Grant on Thursday would certainly have felt stunned this week, but this was not what the company’s Chief Content Officer meant in his use of the word “amazing.”
Instead, Levesque was referring to WWE’s deal with Netflix and the appointment of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to parent company TKO’s board of directors. This is the same board of directors of which Vince McMahon was Executive Chairman until his resignation on Friday.
Levesque, who is Vince McMahon’s son-in-law, wanted to “focus on the positive” on Saturday night. Perhaps that is not surprising from the standpoint of a corporate officer. However, the appalling allegations levied against Vince McMahon, former executive John Laurinaitis, and WWE institutionally, demanded much more.
Perhaps most stunningly, when answering a simple and direct question from Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics, Levesque said that he had not read Janel Grant’s lawsuit. Yes, it is 67 pages in length. However, if this part-time reporter can devote the time to read it in order to have an informed conversation on a podcast, one would imagine a member of the WWE Board would, too.
Although a civil action, Ms. Grant’s allegations include grave crimes including instances of rape, extreme sexual assault, physical injuries, being trafficked to friends of McMahon, being offered up as an enticement to the re-signing of one of the most prominent WWE stars, and an institutional willful blind eye being taken to all of this by the company she worked for.
While much of the detail is difficult to process, on balance it is surely a positive to be confronted by the stark reality of what can lie behind stock phrases such as “non-disclosure agreement”, “allegations of misconduct”, “hush money” etc.
The details of what those terms can really mean were revealed due to the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, the Speak Out Act, and non-payments by McMahon. Any or all of the above may allow an NDA to be invalidated in certain circumstances.
The details in Janel Grant’s lawsuit are outlined in graphic and frankly nauseating detail, together with compelling evidence in the form of text messages and references to videos, photographs, and other supporting material.
The alleged text messages alone offer a window into the mindset of a man with a deeply sick attitude to sexual relations as well as a sense of huge personal power and untouchability.
Surely, the WWE’s Chief Content Officer is aware of the majority of these allegations, even if we take at face value his assertion that he has not read the lawsuit in its entirety.
Given that, Paul Levesque’s responses to the questions that he was posed on Saturday night seem woefully inadequate.
So, what did he say?
Jon Alba of Fightful asked the following question:
It was about a year ago that the WWE board of directors unanimously opposed Vince’s return to the company as executive chair due to the ongoing investigations at the time, before ultimately voting him back into power. You, Stephanie, Nick Khan, were part of that.
What degree of knowledge of the current accusations against him did you guys have at the time and how does the situation affect WWE’s relationship with partners going forward?
Levesque’s response:
I’m going to do exactly what you would expect me to do here. We just had an amazing week. Ten-year, $5 billion Netflix deal. The Rock joining our board. Just sold out the Royal Rumble and put 48,000 people in Tropicana Field. I choose to focus on the positive. And, yes, there is a negative but I want to focus on that and keep it to that.
Cameron Hawkins of The Ringer asked this question:
Just what’s being put in place just to make sure that employees feel safe so they don’t feel like they’re taking advantage of? Just what is being done to make sure that people in positions of power can’t take advantage of employees under them?
Levesque replied:
I’ll give you the most generalized answer I can. Everything possible. That is a very important thing to us, a very important topic to us. It’s as simple as everything possible.
Finally, Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics asked:
Did you read the lawsuit that came out this week? And, if you did, what was your reaction to it?
Levesque’s response:
I did not. I did not. Cody mentioned it, we all found out real time when you were. That’s the truth. I’ll go back to what I said before. It’s an amazing week for us. I don’t even want to get bogged down in the negatives of it. I just want to focus on the positives and where we’re going. We’re at the most exciting time of the year for us and the most exciting point, to me, business-wise, that we’ve ever had.
To summarize, he wanted to accentuate the positive and said he wanted to ensure WWE would do everything possible to ensure staff and talent are safe, but had not read the complaint.
To be fair to Levesque, he did show up at Saturday’s press conference and did not entirely shut down questions under the pretext of “legal reasons” or a simple “no comment”. It is also important to emphasize that he is not implicated by name in Janel Grant’s lawsuit.
Neither is he the sole person answerable in this situation, particularly now that WWE has a parent company. That said, he is the most prominent current public face of WWE, and he voluntarily put himself in a position to be asked questions on Saturday.
Given the grievous nature of the allegations against McMahon, Laurinaitis, and WWE, Levesque did not say anything close to enough.
As fans and followers of this product, we must demand more.
What did the then WWE Board members know about the allegations and when did they know it?
Why did they come to a unanimous decision that McMahon should not return to the board in late 2022?
What does “everything possible” really mean in terms of concrete systems and a properly independent process for whistleblowing, complaints, and investigations?
Will all TKO and WWE Board members fully familiarize themselves with the allegations so that appropriate preventative measures can be instituted?
Perhaps above all, in a world where money talks, we must hope that shareholders, corporate partners, and sponsors will demand answers to those questions and others.
McMahon has denied the allegations, and TKO has issued a statement on the matter. Now, we can add Levesque’s very limited comments from Saturday’s press conference.
When set against the excruciating detail in Ms Grant’s lawsuit, those responses look pitiful.
