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When ESPN fired Lee Fitting in August 2023, it was a surprise. Fitting, a Senior Vice President with 25 years at the network, was reportedly let go after numerous allegations of misconduct. According to The Athletic, which broke the news this month, his alleged behavior included objectifying comments about women, crude jokes, and inappropriate criticisms of physical appearances. Fitting’s sudden exit came just weeks before the new season of College Gameday, the program he worked on as head of production. Fitting’s spokesperson denied some of the allegations but didn’t address others.
By January 2024, Fitting resurfaced—as WWE’s new head of production. It wasn’t a surprising hire. Fitting played a key role on one of the most popular pre-game shows on television. WWE President Nick Khan is deeply connected to the sports media world. When he was a CAA agent, his clients included many ESPN personalities and Gameday on-air talent like Kirk Herbstreit and Tom Rinaldi.
But Fitting’s hiring—now that we know why he left ESPN—raises questions about how serious Khan is about reforming WWE’s culture and reputation following perhaps the biggest scandal in the company’s history. Fitting’s hiring would be questionable enough if this wasn’t Khan’s first hiring of an executive with a history of alleged sexual misconduct, and if Khan hadn’t so readily expressed loyalty to Vince McMahon after he tried to return from disgrace in 2023.
In 2017, Jamie Horowitz was fired from Fox Sports amid allegations of sexual harassment. Horowitz’s attorney lamented he’d been treated unfairly. Fox described his termination as “fully warranted.” But by June 2021 Khan brought Horowitz into WWE as Executive Vice President of Digital & Development. Horowitz stayed on until late 2023, leaving after WWE’s merger with UFC.
In 2022, the company’s Board of Directors—of which Khan was a member—investigated McMahon after it was discovered he paid millions to women who worked for WWE who he allegedly harassed or assaulted. Those women included Janel Grant, a former paralegal who later further alleged McMahon trafficked her. As most reading this know, McMahon resigned in July 2022 but returned five months later using his superior voting shares, putting himself back on the Board.
By the time of Vince’s return, Khan, as a Board member would have understood the allegations against McMahon better than nearly anyone: four women with non-disclosure agreements, including a former talent who accused McMahon of coercing her into oral sex, an additional two alleged misconduct incidents at spas, and former WWF referee Rita Chatterton’s allegation of rape. That’s seven different women alleging misconduct against McMahon, most of whom worked for him. But for Khan, McMahon’s return seemed inevitable. He told Bill Simmons, days after Vince’s comeback, that during McMahon’s hiatus, Khan maintained contact.
“I made a point, as did others, to see him once a month or so while he was sitting out,” Khan said on Simmons’ podcast, framing McMahon as a sympathetic figure. “I think those things are important and it’s no different, in my opinion than when other mutual friends of ours who have gone through hard times professionally, that’s when they sort of need to hear from folks most, that, hey, you haven’t forgotten about them and you’re appreciative of them and all of those things.”
When Vince’s comeback in January 2023 prompted the resignation of multiple Board members—including his own daughter, Stephanie—Khan stayed on. He and current Chief Content Officer Paul Levesque (McMahon’s son-in-law) were still a part of the Board when the members unanimously voted to restore McMahon as Executive Chairman.
Independent directors Ignace Lahoud and Man Jit Singh quit the Board rather than cooperate with Vince’s return.
“It wasn’t aligned with my way of seeing what governance is,” Lahoud told the LA Times in September 2023. “There was a misalignment with what my values are.”
WWE’s decision to hire Fitting to such a prominent position less than a year later raises obvious questions about the company’s priorities. If reporter Andrew Marchand indicated something was afoul immediately after Fitting’s firing in August 2023, and if The Athletic could source more than 20 women to learn more about his exit, it’s hard to imagine Khan—one of the most well-connected figures in sports media—didn’t know why he was fired, or couldn’t easily find out. WWE was indeed aware of why Fitting left ESPN, according to PWInsider.
What other conclusion can be made than that being fired from your previous job for creating a toxic work environment for women at least isn’t a deal-breaker when being considered for one of the top executive roles in WWE even in early 2024, with headlines of McMahon’s alleged abuse in the recent past—and worse headlines in the near future.
Just three weeks after Fitting’s hiring, Grant filed her lawsuit against McMahon and WWE. Her complaint alleged in graphic detail not only sex trafficking and multiple sexual assaults but also that WWE’s culture and leadership enabled it. The suit identified “WWE Corporate Officer No. 1″—who Grant’s attorney later confirmed is a pseudonym for Nick Khan—as an executive who she says was supportive of the CEO’s relationship with the paralegal under his employ. While Grant did not accuse Khan of any direct abuse, she claimed he was aware of McMahon’s relationship with her.
“WWE takes Ms. Grant’s allegations very seriously and has no tolerance for any physical abuse or unwanted physical contact,” a WWE spokesperson said in one of the company’s only acknowledgements of the lawsuit, in March. WWE also added that Khan didn’t know of any allegations of abuse before Grant’s lawsuit was made public.
With few exceptions, WWE has repeatedly avoided commenting on these allegations or broader issues about its culture. Silence might be a part of their strategy to avoid further legal complications and to minimize negative press. Or it might reflect leadership’s lack of understanding and empathy for misconduct in the workplace and how to handle it, even with words. Look no further than Levesque’s bewilderment at how to respond when faced with press questions about the Grant case a few days after it was filed.
Nor have executives addressed the “ring boy” lawsuit filed in October, which alleges a history of sexual abuse allegations within WWE—of children in that case—throughout the 1980s.
A few months ago, Grant’s representatives called on WWE to release any women from NDAs who may have experienced misconduct at the company, similar to how NDAs were eventually waived by Harvey Weinstein’s company. WWE hasn’t acknowledged that demand at all.
The history of wrestling in many ways is a history of people in charge trying to ignore what everyone else is thinking. The new era of WWE is so far no different.
Wrestlemania 41 last April was presented as a symbolic turning point. Khan and Head of Communications Chris Legentil made subtle on-screen appearances. Levesque, especially, and Bruce Prichard were celebrated before the audience. During the post-show press conference, Levesque praised Fitting, too, for his contributions. The message was clear to anyone looking past the matches and the spectacle of Wrestlemania: Vince is gone; this is a new era.
But is it? Under Khan’s leadership, WWE has become more profitable than ever. Yet despite the deals, profits, and symbolic gestures, there’s little to publicly suggest the company is all that serious about changing its culture. Khan’s polished and affable image as a dealmaker—beloved by the sports media he enriched—distracts from his role in upholding pro wrestling’s time-honored tradition of not letting sexual abuse allegations get in the way of business.
It’s hard to find anything Khan has said or done in public that offsets his actions regarding Fitting and Horowitz and both his actions and statements regarding McMahon. Khan has rarely addressed McMahon’s scandals publicly, and when he has, it’s among other topics with media friendlies like Bill Simmons and Matt Belloni, who know enough about WWE to be fascinated by its exciting business and to giggle at its zany form of entertainment, but not enough to question whether there are any ethics at the heart of Khan’s leadership.
On the other hand, maybe the WWE President, in another of his savvy calculations, observed that genuinely raising the company’s standards isn’t worth the effort, and that hiring someone like Fitting to a top job in WWE was too good to pass up, even though WWE reportedly knew why Fitting left ESPN.
After all, this is pro wrestling, where—still more than the rest of the world—abuse often doesn’t have real consequences for those who cause or enable it, especially if they’re powerful. Fans are largely indifferent. Media is mostly oblivious. And business partners care only as much as headlines force them to. So hiring Fitting isn’t out of step with WWE’s long-standing openness to leaders who may cultivate a hostile workplace for women or others.
You might think the new Vince McMahon-free WWE would work hard to distance itself from being seen as a refuge for those accused of harassment and abuse. But maybe Nick Khan knows that not enough people really care about that. Maybe he doesn’t, either.
