The NFL may not be able to publicly release the findings of its internal investigation of the Washington Commanders without the explicit permission of owner Daniel Snyder, according to a document released Friday morning by the congressional committee investigating the NFL.
The House Committee for Oversight and Reform also released a second document Friday that shows how the team requested a “written investigation” from Beth Wilkinson’s law firm when she was hired to conduct an internal investigation of the team.
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has previously contended the league cannot release the internal investigation because Wilkinson presented her findings orally.
The documents released on Friday were provided by the NFL as part of the league’s response to the congressional investigation into what the committee calls a decades-long toxic work environment under Snyder’s tenure.
Five women appeared before Congress on Thursday, detailing their alleged experiences of sexual assault and harassment. Tiffani Johnston, a former marketing and events coordinator for the team, revealed for the first time that Snyder touched her without her consent during a work dinner about 13 years ago. Snyder issued a statement denying her allegations.
The women and multiple members of Congress are demanding the NFL release its report to the public.
During Thursday’s roundtable discussion, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Illinois) noted that, “The NFL has released reports on Ray Rice, the Carolina Panthers, Deflategate, but nothing, nothing with regard to sexual harassment and Washington.”
In the wake of Johnston’s revelations and based on testimony provided by the other women, Krishnamoorthi and Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-New York), the chair of the committee, sent a new letter to Goodell on Friday morning.
In the letter, Maloney and Krishnamoorthi tell the commissioner, “You have claimed that the NFL did not release Ms. Wilkinson’s findings in order to protect the ‘security, privacy and anonymity’ of the more than 150 witnesses who courageously spoke to Ms. Wilkinson and her team. The Committee’s investigation and the NFL’s own legal documents raise serious doubts about this justification.”
Congress initiated its investigation of the team in October, demanding the NFL release the Wilkinson report, as well as other documents relating to her investigation. The NFL has provided some, but not all, of the documents to committee staff. Krishnamoorthi told ESPN on Thursday that the NFL has yet to provide Wilkinson’s report, and that there are more than 650,000 emails and documents related to the investigation.
Friday marks the first time the congressional committee has released any of the documents submitted by the NFL.
In August 2020, the Washington Commanders, known as the Washington Football Team at the time, signed a retainer agreement — called an “Engagement Letter” — with Wilkinson and her firm. Some of the document is redacted, but the agreement states that Wilkinson’s firm will “complete a written report of its findings and make recommendations regarding any remedial measures.”
“After assuming oversight of the investigation, however, Mr. Goodell personally instructed that Ms. Wilkinson was to present him with oral, not written, findings in a stark departure from the League’s previous practices,” according to a statement released by the congressional committee Friday morning.
On December 15, 2021, NFL.com stated, “The NFL said there was no written report of Wilkinson’s inquiry” and only issued a four-page news release.
“Your decision not to release the written report is deeply concerning,” Maloney and Krishnamoorthi told Goodell in their new letter.
One month later after inking the agreement with Wilkinson, a second document entitled a “Common Interest Agreement” dated September 8, 2020, details how the NFL and the team pledged to pursue a “joint legal strategy,” agreeing not to share any privileged documents or information exchanged during the investigation without the consent of both the NFL and the team.
The signatures of the two individuals who signed the agreement are redacted, with only “Washington Football Team” and “National Football League, Inc.” visible under the signature line. The committee typically redacts names, signatures and similar information when it releases these types of documents to the public, a source said.
In a statement, the congressional committee says the document “appears to apply retroactively to July 16, 2020 — the beginning of the internal investigation by Ms. Wilkinson.”
Committee lawyers and staff have interpreted this to mean that under this agreement, “the NFL may not have been able to release the results of the Wilkinson investigation to the public without the permission of team owner Daniel Snyder, who himself has been accused of multiple acts of sexual misconduct by his employees, most recently during yesterday’s Committee roundtable,” according to the statement issued by the committee Friday morning.
When asked to clarify whether the team had discussed, threatened or asserted its privilege under the terms of the agreement, attorneys for the team told the committee, “The Team, and the NFL, have always acted in a manner consistent with the maintenance of that privilege, and there have been discussions, too numerous to recount (which are themselves privileged), regarding the preservation of that privilege.”
In Maloney and Krishnamoorthi’s letter to Goodell, they state the NFL withdrew from the common interest agreement in October around the same time Congress launched its investigation.
“These documents, which were gathered and created as part of the Wilkinson investigation, were stored on servers of a third-party vendor, where they remain. Now, after the NFL’s withdrawal from the agreement, each party claims that absent the other’s consent, they cannot access the documents, let alone release them to the Committee. By dissolving their common interest agreement and withholding consent, the parties may be attempting to create a legal limbo to stop the Committee from obtaining these key investigation documents.”
Snyder, the team, the NFL and others involved in the congressional investigation have not responded to ESPN’s requests for comment.
ESPN’s John Keim contributed to this report.