Ethics CasesSport

Cases · National Football League · 2020–2023

Dan Snyder, the Commanders and Workplace Misconduct

In 2020, The Washington Post reported allegations from dozens of former women employees of Washington's NFL team describing sexual harassment and a hostile workplace. An NFL-overseen review by lawyer Beth Wilkinson led the league to fine the team $10 million in 2021, but the league did not release a written report. A congressional committee's Democratic staff later accused the NFL of burying findings. A second investigation by former SEC chair Mary Jo White sustained a former employee's allegations that owner Dan Snyder touched her without consent and pushed her toward his car, and found that the club withheld shareable revenue. Snyder, who denied the allegations, sold the team for $6.05 billion in 2023 and agreed to pay the NFL $60 million. The case raises questions about league self-regulation, transparency and accountability for owners.

By Tanner Simkins, editor

Timeline

  1. The Washington Post reports allegations by former women employees.
  2. The NFL fines the team $10 million after the Wilkinson review; no written report is released.
  3. A former employee testifies at a congressional roundtable; the NFL appoints Mary Jo White.
  4. House Oversight Committee Democrats release a report criticizing the team and the NFL.
  5. White's findings are released; Snyder agrees to pay $60 million; owners approve the sale.

The ethical issues

  • League self-regulation: owners investigating owners.
  • Transparency: releasing investigation findings.
  • Workplace safety for women employees.
  • Accountability: consequences for owners.
  • Nondisclosure agreements and settlements.

Stakeholders

StakeholderInterests & obligations
Former and current employeesSafety, accountability and voice.
Dan SnyderReputation and investment.
NFL and other ownersLeague image and legal exposure.
FansTrust in the team.
Congress and regulatorsOversight of workplace and consumer issues.
Ticket holdersReturn of deposits.

The case

Dan Snyder bought Washington’s NFL team in 1999.[1] In July 2020, The Washington Post published reports in which more than 40 former women employees, including office staff and cheerleaders, alleged sexual harassment and discrimination by executives and others at the team.[1]

Background

Snyder made his fortune through Snyder Communications, a marketing company he founded in 1989. In May 1999 he bought the team and its stadium for $800 million from the estate of Jack Kent Cooke.[1] In 2003 he sold minority stakes to three investors, including FedEx founder Frederick W. Smith, to pay down debt.[1]

His tenure was marked by repeated controversy. For years he refused to change the team’s name, which Native American advocates considered a slur, and declined to meet with them.[1] In 2020, after the protests that followed George Floyd’s murder, 87 investors wrote to sponsors Nike, FedEx and PepsiCo urging them to cut ties unless the name changed. The team played as the Washington Football Team for two seasons before becoming the Commanders in 2022.[1] The harassment reports came the same month the name change was announced. That year, Snyder also blocked his minority partners from selling their combined 35% stake to an outsider by exercising his right of first refusal.[1]

The rules and governance

Two governance systems overlapped. Inside the league, the commissioner disciplined the club, and the other owners had to approve any sale.[1][2] The league chose how to report its findings. After the Wilkinson review, it gave only an oral summary and the $10 million fine, not a written report.[1][2] For the second investigation, the NFL hired Mary Jo White and published her report.[4][5]

Outside the league, public authorities used their own powers. The House Oversight Committee investigated the NFL’s handling of the matter and released its staff report.[3] Washington, D.C.’s attorney general, Karl Racine, filed a consumer protection lawsuit against Snyder and the NFL.[1] The committee referred the financial allegations to the Federal Trade Commission.[1][5]

The Wilkinson review

The team hired lawyer Beth Wilkinson in July 2020, and the NFL soon took over oversight of the review. She interviewed more than 150 people, many on condition of anonymity.[2] On July 1, 2021, Commissioner Roger Goodell concluded that “for many years the workplace environment at the Washington Football Team, both generally and particularly for women, was highly unprofessional,” with frequent bullying and intimidation and numerous reports of sexual harassment. “Ownership and senior management paid little or no attention to these issues.”[2] The NFL fined the team $10 million, and Snyder’s wife took over day-to-day operations for a time.[1][2] The league did not release a written report, which drew criticism.[1]

Congress

A House committee investigated. On December 8, 2022, its Democratic majority released a staff report titled “Conduct Detrimental,” which said sexual harassment and bullying had “pervaded” the workplace, “perpetuated by a culture of fear instilled by the Team’s owner,” and that the NFL had “buried the investigation’s findings.”[3] Snyder testified voluntarily in July 2022; the report said some of his answers were misleading.[1] The committee also referred allegations about withheld ticket revenue and fans’ security deposits to the Federal Trade Commission.[1][5]

The White investigation

After a former cheerleader and marketing employee testified at a congressional roundtable in February 2022, the NFL hired former SEC chair Mary Jo White, and later expanded her inquiry to financial allegations.[4][5] Her report, released July 20, 2023, sustained the allegations that Snyder put his hand on the employee’s thigh without consent at a work dinner and pushed her toward his car afterward.[5] It sustained allegations that the club intentionally withheld shareable NFL revenue, identifying about $11 million, but neither found nor ruled out that Snyder personally directed it.[5] It found that “both Mr. Snyder and the Club failed to cooperate.”[5] Snyder had called the harassment allegation “outright lies” and denied all such conduct.[5]

The sale

Snyder agreed to pay the NFL $60 million “in resolution of Ms. White’s findings and all outstanding matters.”[4] On July 20, 2023, the other owners unanimously approved the sale of the team to a group led by Josh Harris for $6.05 billion, then a record for a sports team.[1]

Aftermath

Snyder began negotiating with Josh Harris’s group in April 2023 and reached an agreement in May. The owners’ unanimous approval in July completed his exit.[1] The $60 million payment and the White report were announced the same day as the sale vote.[4]

The public enforcement cases outlasted his ownership. The deposit allegations that the House committee had flagged in an April 2022 letter led to an investigation by the District’s attorney general.[6] That office concluded that for years the team had sold multi-year premium ticket contracts that required a security deposit, promised to return the deposits within 30 days after a contract ended, and then kept many of them for years. It added conditions that made refunds harder to claim and continued the practice even after an employee warned in 2009 that it violated the contracts. As of March 2022, the team still held more than $200,000 in deposits owed to District residents.[6] In April 2023, before the sale, the team agreed to return the deposits under outreach procedures supervised by the attorney general’s office and to pay the District $425,000.[6]

The separate 2022 consumer protection lawsuit alleged that the team under Snyder had deceived District residents about the workplace investigation to protect its brand and keep fans buying tickets and merchandise.[7] On March 2, 2026, the attorney general announced that Pro-Football LLC, the team’s corporate owner, would pay $1 million to resolve it. The settlement requires the team to keep a human resources department, an anti-harassment policy and an investigation protocol for misconduct complaints.[7] Attorney General Brian Schwalb credited the new owners with “committing to ensure all employees are protected from abuse and treated with dignity” and thanked “the victims for coming forward to tell their stories.”[7] The settlement was paid by the team under its new ownership, not by Snyder personally, and it resolved allegations rather than producing a court finding.[7]

The core dilemma

The NFL is governed by its owners, who must investigate and discipline one another. Employees wanted transparency and accountability. The league cited witness confidentiality and imposed fines; the owner left with a record sale price. Did the system deliver justice?

Competing values

  • Confidentiality vs. transparency.
  • League self-governance vs. external oversight.
  • Punishment vs. resolution.
  • Due process for the accused vs. accountability.

Strongest arguments

For the NFL’s approach: confidentiality encouraged witnesses to speak, the league imposed significant fines, and the outcome removed the owner.

Against: the league withheld findings, Snyder faced no suspension and profited from the sale, and the episode suggests owners are not held to the standards applied to players.

Applying the frameworks

Kantian (duty)

A Kantian lens asks whether team leaders treated employees, especially women in junior roles, as ends in themselves. Findings of pervasive harassment and indifference by ownership describe a workplace that treated people as means. The lens also judges the league: did keeping the first review’s findings oral fulfill its duty of honesty to those who came forward?

Justice

Justice looks at accountability and proportion. Employees who described harassment bore the costs of speaking out, while the owner left with a record sale price. The lens weighs whether the $10 million and $60 million penalties, and an exit on Snyder’s own terms, were proportionate, and whether the absence of a written first report served the powerful.

Ethics of care

The care lens centers on the employees and cheerleaders who described a culture of fear. It asks whether investigations were designed around their needs, including confidentiality, support and a voice in outcomes, or around the institution’s reputation. The decision to promise anonymity encouraged participation; the decision not to publish the findings left participants without visible acknowledgment.

Walk it through: the Simple Decision Model

  1. Spot the issue. You are an NFL executive in July 2021, receiving Beth Wilkinson’s oral findings. The stakeholders include former and current employees, the team owner, other owners, sponsors, fans and Congress. The codes in play are the NFL constitution’s conduct-detrimental provisions, employment law and the confidentiality promises made to witnesses.
  2. Gather facts. What do the findings establish, and what remains unknown? How might the league’s relationship with an owner shape what you choose to put in writing?
  3. Test options. Options: (a) oral summary and fine only; (b) a written report with identifying details redacted; (c) a written report plus independent monitoring of workplace reforms. Weigh duties to witnesses, transparency and legal risk.
  4. Check codes and law. Would your approach be seen as fair by those who came forward? Would it hold up before a congressional committee?
  5. Decide and document. Document the findings, the reasons for your disclosure decision and the confidentiality protections.
  6. Communicate and follow up. Communicate directly with participants before the public announcement, explain the decision publicly, and set measurable reforms with deadlines.

What’s settled and what’s contested

  • Settled: the Wilkinson outcome; White’s findings; the fine and sale.
  • Contested: whether the NFL protected employees or itself.

Why this case matters

The case shows the limits of self-regulation when the accused is one of the league’s owners.

Key terms

Institutional accountability
Structures that make a sport organization explain its decisions and face consequences: clear authority, transparency, appeals, independent oversight and enforcement.
Whistleblowing
Disclosure of wrongdoing in the public interest by someone inside or close to an organization: a moral safety valve.
Crisis ethics
The obligations that apply when an organization is under pressure: honesty, timeliness, accountability and care for those harmed.
Principal–agent problem
When those acting on others’ behalf (agents such as executives, officials or agents) have interests that diverge from the people they serve.

Definitions from the Ethics Cases glossary.

Discussion questions

  1. Was the NFL right not to release a written report from the Wilkinson review?
  2. Should owners be subject to the same discipline as players?
  3. Was a fine and a sale an adequate outcome?
  4. What role should Congress play in overseeing private sports leagues?
  5. How should organizations balance privacy of witnesses with public accountability?

Sources

  1. Daniel Snyder — Wikipedia
  2. NFL announces outcome of Washington Football Team workplace review — NFL.com
  3. Oversight Committee Releases Final Report on Investigation into the NFL's Handling of Washington Commanders' Hostile Workplace Culture — U.S. House Committee on Oversight
  4. Findings and outcome of Mary Jo White's investigation into Commanders announced — NFL.com
  5. Report of Findings of the Investigation Regarding Daniel Snyder and the Washington Commanders — Debevoise & Plimpton (via NFL)
  6. AG Schwalb Secures Over $625,000 from Washington Commanders for Failing to Return District's Fans' Ticket Deposits — Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia
  7. Attorney General Schwalb Resolves Snyder-Era Lawsuit Against Washington Commanders (Mar 2, 2026) — Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia