NFL Working With Florida AG on Probe Into Its Race-Based Hiring Practices

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said the league was cooperating with Florida authorities on an investigation into its race-based hiring rule for certain coaching positions.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sent a subpoena to the NFL on May 13 as part of an investigation into potential civil rights violations related to the league’s Rooney Rule and other employment practices, policies, and programs.

“I think we have been very clear about our programs, and we obviously evaluate them all the time, not just for how they get better, but also to make sure that they’re consistent with the law,” Goodell said Tuesday during league meetings in Orlando, Florida.

“We’re engaging with the Florida attorney general and will continue to. We’ll share everything we’re doing with them. We think it’s certainly within the law, but also something very positive,” Goodell said.

Uthmeier sent a letter to Goodell in March cautioning him about the hiring practices and diversity initiatives that the state attorney general called “blatant race and sex discrimination.”

Uthmeier asked Goodell to confirm the NFL would no longer enforce the rule after May 1.

The Rooney Rule, named after late Pittsburgh Steelers owner Dan Rooney, was established ahead of the 2003 regular season based on the league’s Workplace Diversity Committee, according to the NFL. Rooney served as chairman of the committee at the time.

The committee’s reason for the rule focused on the historically low number of minorities in head coaching positions.

The rule originally required every team with a head coaching vacancy to interview at least one or more minority candidate before hiring a new coach.

As time passed, the rule changed to include more positions. NFL teams are now required to interview at least two external candidates who are people of color and/or women for vacant head coach, general manager, and coordinator positions.

For vacant quarterback coach and senior-level executive jobs, the rule requires teams to interview at least one candidate who is a person of color and/or a woman, according to the NFL.

Teams that have a person of color or a woman executive as a head coach, or primary football executive, are awarded a third-round draft pick as part of the Rooney Rule.

These hiring requirements violate Florida’s Civil Rights Act, according to Uthmeier.

“The NFL’s use of the Rooney Rule violates Florida law by requiring race-based considerations in hiring,” Uthmeier said in an announcement video on March 25. “Florida law is clear: Hiring decisions cannot be based on race. And the Rooney Rule mandates race-based interviews and incentivizes race-based decisions. That’s discrimination.”

Florida is demanding that the NFL suspend the rule and has threatened enforcement actions if the league fails to stop using the rule.

“NFL teams and their fans don’t care about the race of their teams and their coaching staff,” Uthmeier said. “They want a merit-based system that gives their team the best chance to win.”

The subpoena orders the league to appear at the attorney general’s office in Tallahassee, Florida, on June 12.