Sen. Richard Blumenthal on his Senate investigation into the PGA-LIV Golf merger.
In a shock twist in professional sports last week, the PGA Tour and the Saudi-backed LIV Golf league—who’ve spent the past year viciously battling for control of the sport’s future—went public with a “framework agreement” to join forces. This union would end the Professional Golf Wars by giving Saudis what they wanted all along: an ownership stake in the sport, and the economic legitimacy that comes with it.
The handholding and cheery joint interviews between Jay Monahan, the PGA Tour’s commissioner, and Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, were a dramatic turn from the sniping that had defined the past year’s competition. Almost exactly a year earlier, Monahan had played the 9/11 card against his rival’s sovereign backers and their dirty money. Now, that same money—of which there is much—would be injected into Monahan’s product.
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
The framework agreement, negotiated so secretly that even Tiger Woods reportedly didn’t have a clue, infuriated those who’d sided with the PGA Tour. Players who turned down lucrative offers from LIV out of loyalty to the PGA Tour, only to watch the tour take that money for itself, chewed Monahan out in a subsequent meeting. 9/11 Families United’s leader, Terry Strada, said that Monahan had “co-opted the 9/11 community,” and that “their concern for our loved ones was merely window-dressing in their quest for money.” Tour leadership made players such as Rory McIlroy, who used his own valuable time and reputation to lead the moral crusade against LIV, look like a chump.
The deal, as it was reported, has a long way to go. The “framework agreement” has to be filled out without falling apart. Tour players would have to approve it. It would have to get through the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust scrutiny. That’s no sure thing, given how this deal would lump the assets of all major golf tours into one—anyone know a good prefix for that number?—for-profit entity. Monahan, himself, described the deal as taking “the competitor off of the board.”
Advertisement
Advertisement
And on Monday, a new hurdle arose.
Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a longtime critic of the Saudis who’s worked closely with the 9/11 families over the years, announced a probe of the deal in his capacity as chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. In letters sent to leadership of both the PGA Tour and LIV Golf on Monday, Blumenthal requested a comprehensive list of records and communications from the groups relating to the dispute and the proposed agreement since October 2021. The deadline to turn them over is June 26.
Advertisement
In an interview Monday afternoon, Blumenthal told me he’s not assuming the tours will blow him off. If they do, however, he’s prepared to use the tools available to him.
Advertisement
“I have no reason to believe that they won’t cooperate right now,” Blumenthal told me. “But I would look very harshly on their refusing to make these documents and other evidence available. And we have the power to subpoena; I see no reason why we wouldn’t use it if they just stonewall us.”
In a statement sent to me about the investigation, the PGA Tour assured that all was above-board.
“We are confident that once Congress learns more about how the PGA TOUR will control this new venture, they will understand the opportunities this will create for our players, our communities and our sport, all while protecting an American golf institution,” the Tour said.
Advertisement
Advertisement
The Tour did not respond to a question about whether they would comply with Blumenthal’s records request.
Advertisement
When I tweeted the news on Monday that Blumenthal was opening a Senate investigation of the deal, a common reply was along the lines of: Doesn’t Congress have better things to investigate than golf?
Blumenthal noted that he, through his committee work, was also currently looking into artificial intelligence, Medicare Advantage, and “trying to protect kids on the internet,” among other things.
“But let’s be real,” he said. “Sports play a role in our society, in our culture. Athletes are role models, they are at the forefront of social change, and civil rights.” He noted that a lot of golfers, “to their immense credit,” suffered a lot to stay with the PGA Tour. “I met with some of them over this past year,” he said, “and they are just people to be admired.”
Advertisement
Advertisement
(I asked him if he met with Rory McIlroy. “I’m not going to go into individuals,” he said.)
And those golfers, he said, “have been sold out. Just like the 9/11 families. I think Americans should be passionate about this issue.” Golf, he said, is “truly a kind of American, iconic sport. And here we are, the Saudis assuming control over it.” (Control is a strong word. Under the proposed deal, the Saudi Public Investment Fund would get a minority stake in the new for-profit megacompany, and a minority of seats on the board. It’s a good seat, however: The chairman would be al-Rumayyan.)
Related from Slate Alex Kirshner The PGA Tour’s Grim, Blockbuster Merger Read More
The goal of the probe, for now, is to apply sunlight to the opaque, multibillion-dollar dealings that have seen a sovereign nation with an atrocious human rights record buy itself a chair at the table—the big chair, in fact—of a major global sport to improve its image.
Advertisement
“Right now, we want to know the facts,” Blumenthal said. “We want to know how this deal developed, who said what to whom, what promises were made, what the emails were. Because I think there are a lot of people who are totally mystified and perplexed, as well as outraged, by this complete reversal by Jay Monahan and the PGA.”
One possible outcome of the senator’s probe that he suggested could be that the PGA Tour might want to “act voluntarily and change its leadership.” Generally, though, he found my annoying questions about any looming subpoenas, hearings, or possible legislation emerging from the probe annoying. Just as the proposal is still in its infancy, so is his Senate inquiry, and he doesn’t know what the results will be.
“If I may draw a comparison,” he said, “I’m not going to tell you what I’m doing on the 8th hole if I get in the sand trap there.”
I said he’d probably use a sand wedge.
“Maybe that’s the wrong analogy.”
Source: Slate
