TKO's legal war against your taxpayer rights
TKO's legal war against your taxpayer rights
A "trade secrets" lawsuit in Austin, Texas threatens to permanently seal their government contracts.
Congratulations on UFC & WWE for relying upon Boeing’s legal tactics as a matter of public policy.
It’s good to know that they all share a hostile attitude regarding public disclosure of business practices.
In a small district courtroom, the 345th Civil District Court in Austin, Texas to be exact, World Wrestling Entertainment decided to file a lawsuit against Attorney General Ken Paxton and the state of Texas because a citizen had the temerity to file a records request. The requestor wanted to know how much taxpayer cash the vampires at TKO sucked out of the City of San Antonio for a site fee to deliver a major event (the Royal Rumble at the Alamodome).
The requestor, Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics, found himself in the middle of a tug-a-war over what San Antonio would or wouldn’t reveal.
Enter WWE. Using “Super Lawyer” and FINRA arbitrator Tricia DeLeon from the high-powered Dallas law firm Holland & Knight, WWE filed a lawsuit to block details relating to their Agreement with the City of San Antonio from being released.
(The MMA Draw contacted Ms. DeLeon on Monday evening for comment. We received no response to our inquiry.)
Citing Boeing Co v Paxton, Mr. Thurston received a pro forma letter from Ms. DeLeon stating the following — we’ve sued, so you can either file a motion to intervene and spend big bucks on legal expenses… or else you can waive your right to challenge our legal arguments. Or you can just withdraw your public records request and this can all go away.
This nasty yet legal tactic against Mr. Thurston is a classic example of a major corporation or political player turning the tables against a citizen and a taxpayer.
Not only do we claim you have no right to know what your money is being spent on, we’re going to twist a public records act against you and functionally turn it into a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation.
In the name of process service, we’re making sure that by receiving our notice of lawsuit that you know that your personal contact information provided in the records request is now in the hands of the disgruntled party in question.
“Democracy Dies in Darkness”
You would think that a taxpayer who is funding city and state contracts to buy UFC & WWE events from TKO would have maximum standing and legal rights for inquiry. Instead, they have the least amount of rights and protections. You can thank a deadly combination of the political questions doctrine and Boeing v Paxton case law for that.
WWE’s lawsuit for both injunctive & declaratory relief relies upon claims that their Agreements for taxpayer-funded contracts are trade secrets and that “competitors” shouldn’t be allowed to access such information.
You might think “competitors” means rival promoters like AEW and PFL. It legally can. However, in this context, both WWE and San Antonio argue that “competitors” equals rival cities that could make their own offers for TKO services.
In other words, WWE is arguing that a publicly traded company doing business with government agencies should be as exempt from financial disclosure as a privately owned company. Any disclosure about how much taxpayer cash they get from one city might, hypothetically speaking, damage their ability to “extract value” from other cities who could overbid for future sold shows.
If this sounds preposterous to you, that’s because it is.
This is ridiculously arbitrary & capricious behavior by TKO.
The same publicly traded company that selectively reveals how big some gates and contracts are for some shows but not for others. Wednesday’s conference call with TKO investors highlighted this absurdity.
This is the same company that issues third-party commissioned Economic Impact Reports in order to give political cover to municipalities for the amount of taxpayer cash spent.
Imagine someone accessing your bank account, spending as much money as possible, and then you calling the bank only to be told by an executive that they can’t tell you how much of your money was spent or why it was spent because “it’s a trade secret” that could impact their image and future business dealings with new customers.
In WWE’s lawsuit against Texas, the complaint heavily relies upon Boeing v Paxton. The case law created by the Texas Supreme Court states that a “private” government contractor can ask for non-disclosure of anything relating to “trade secrets” or proprietary information that could provide any advantage to a competitor.
The lone dissent in the ruling ironically came from former Governor Rick Perry’s General Counsel, Justice Jeff Boyd. Justice Boyd warned that the Texas Supreme Court risked destroying the state’s public records act by allowing any company engaged in business with government to cry “trade secrets” and immediately create disclosure exceptions that would eventually force the issue back to TSC in future cases. We’re already seeing this play out in May of 2024 with UnitedHealthCare v Paxton case law established by the Third District Court of Appeals in Austin.
Justice Boyd further stated that companies would automatically make such legal arguments based on hypothetical harm rather than actual examples of past or current ongoing harm.
His warning would turn out to be prescient.
Just what exactly are TKO’s trade secrets?
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