Daniel Snyder Will Not Appear at House Oversight Committee Hearing, per Report

Commanders team owner Dan Snyder will not appear at the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Oversight and Reform’s hearing on June 22, according to The Washington Post. 

Via a four-page letter from his attorney, Snyder declined the request, which was made at the beginning of the month. The committee had requested that Snyder and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell testify in front of the committee concerning the investigation into the Commanders. 

A spokesperson said to the Post, ”The Committee intends to move forward with this hearing. We are currently reviewing Mr. Snyder’s letter and will respond.”

The months-long probe that began in October 2021 is looking into the franchise’s workplace culture, how the league handled misconduct reports, “the NFL’s role in setting and enforcing standards across the League, and legislative reforms needed to address these issues across the NFL and other workplaces,” according to the committee’s press release from earlier this month.

The investigation was brought on after the Post published an article in July 2020 detailing workplace sexual harassment experienced by 15 former employees within the franchise. Snyder also faces several accounts of misconduct, some of which are as follows:

• The Post released another article in 2020 reporting that a former senior executive instructed employees to create a behind-the-scenes video for Snyder. The video included videos of partially naked team cheerleaders from an ’08 team swimsuit calendar shoot.
• The Post previously reported that “lawyers and private investigators working on Snyder’s behalf took steps that potential witnesses … viewed as attempts to interfere with the NFL’s investigation.” The numerous alleged attempts to interfere included reaching a $1.6 million settlement with a former employee who described sexual misconduct by the co-owner and filing petitions to identify employees who had spoken to the Post.

• The committee held a hybrid roundtable with several former employees of the franchise, and Tiffani Johnston detailed new allegations that directly implicated Snyder.

  “I learned that placing me strategically by the owner at a work dinner after this networking event was not for me to discuss business, but to allow him to place his hand on my thigh under the table,” Johnston said in her opening statement. “I learned how to discreetly remove a man’s unwanted hand from my thigh at a crowded dinner table, at a crowded restaurant to avoid a scene. I learned that job survival meant I should continue my conversation with another co-worker rather than to call out Dan Snyder right then, in the moment.

  “I also learned later that evening how to awkwardly laugh while Dan Snyder aggressively pushed me towards his limo with his hand on my lower back, encouraging me to ride with him to my car. I learned how to continue to say no even though a situation was getting more awkward, uncomfortable and physical.”

The team owner denied the allegations in a statement.

Soon after the roundtable, the committee released documents provided to them by the league, which included a Common Interest Agreement between the NFL and Washington and an engagement letter between lawyer Beth Wilkinson’s firm and the franchise. It revealed that not only did Washington agree to a written report being created of Wilkinson’s findings and recommendations, but also that the league would not be able to release the findings without the permission of Snyder, according to the documents. Here is a summary of what was found in the documents. 

Come April, the committee wrote an explosive letter to the Federal Trade Commission, asserting that the Commanders and Snyder “may have engaged in a troubling, long-running, and potentially unlawful pattern of financial conduct that victimized thousands of team fans and the National Football League.”

The letter, a copy of which was sent to Sports Illustrated, included testimony from former Washington sales executive Jason Friedman. Some of the instances cited are as follows.

• Alleged misappropriation of funds, specifically withholding customers’ security deposits on premium seating and using the money for other purposes, that totaled “approximately $5 million” from “around 2,000 accounts.”
• Ticket revenue, which is supposed to be shared with the league, was underreported. Friedman said “the team maintained ‘two sets of books’—one that was shared with the NFL but underreported certain ticket revenue, and another internal set of books that included the complete and accurate revenue and was ‘shown to Mr. Snyder.’”

Here is more on the documents released by the committee, including details of the spreadsheet from Friedman, and how the former Washington sales executive said in his testimony that these financial practices began when things “started to get a little tougher for the team financially,”and noted they were encouraged by senior leadership, including Snyder.

Goodell said in March that Snyder “has not been involved in day-to-day operations.” He added, “Don’t believe he’s been at the team facility at all, and when we continue to have league matters, Tanya [Snyder] has represented the team as the CEO on both a day-to-day basis, but also here with the league.” In July 2021, Dan agreed to temporarily cede control of the team to his wife, Tanya, in wake of widespread controversy surrounding the franchise, of which he was at the center. The announcement came when the league partially released its findings from a workplace misconduct probe, levying a $10 million fine against the team.

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