Nfl Owners, Players Lining Up Lobbyists For Labor Showdown
February 6th, 2010
Congress | 
The NFLs owners set up a political committee that made almost $250,000 in campaign contributions last year, according to Federal Election Commission records. The league has hired its first full-time lobbyist in the capital.
After this weekends Super Bowl between the Indianapolis Colts and New Orleans Saints, the NFL and its players union will focus on negotiations to replace a contract expiring at the end of next season. The NFL Players Association has told members to prepare for a possible lockout by owners, as both sides seek allies on Capitol Hill in case lawmakers get involved in a labor showdown.
Members of Congress would see “political appeal” in pushing to end an NFL work stoppage, said Washington lawyer Stan Brand, former general counsel for the U.S. House and current vice president of Minor League Baseball. “People follow sports in this country with great interest.”
About 30 current and retired NFL players fanned out on Capitol Hill two weeks ago to meet with lawmakers and pose for pictures. At a House Judiciary Committee hearing that day about the NFLs exposure to antitrust laws, members said theyre keeping an eye on a possible labor impasse.
“We need to monitor this particular lockout potential — which we dont want — very closely,” Texas Democratic Representative Sheila Jackson Lee told officials from both the league and the union during the Jan. 22 House hearing. “The product of the player is what the sports fan comes to see.”
Avenue of Attack
In putting extra focus on Washington, the union last year hired as its new executive director DeMaurice Smith, a lawyer at Patton Boggs LLP, which makes more money from lobbying than any other firm, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based research group.
Smiths familiarity with Washington “gave us a different avenue to attack,” said union president Kevin Mawae, the Tennessee Titans center. Smith “knows how to fight a battle that others in the organization didnt know how to fight.”
After the players made the rounds of Congress last month, NFL executive vice president Joe Browne said the focus should be on reaching agreement. “Having DeMaurice Smith and his lawyers focusing more time on serious negotiating and less time trying to use Congress would be a good start,” he said in an e-mail.
Players and the NFL are negotiating a new contract because the owners in 2008 exercised an option to end the current labor agreement in April 2011, two years sooner than scheduled.
Debt Payments
If talks break down, members of Congress may have leverage because lawmakers can revise U.S. antitrust statutes, including a 1961 law allowing NFL owners to jointly sell broadcasting rights.
“Thats the nuclear weapon in the arsenal,” said Representative Linda Sanchez, a California Democrat and former union official who sits on the House Judiciary Committee.
The scope of antitrust restrictions on the NFL was argued on Jan. 13 at the U.S. Supreme Court in a case about an exclusive license with Adidas AGs Reebok to sell hats decorated with team logos. The union filed a brief opposing the NFLs bid for broader antitrust protection in areas such as labor relations.
Whatever the court decides, Congress always has the option of changing the law as it would apply in the future.
More Lobbying
In pressing its case with lawmakers, the union also hired Patton Boggs and spent more than $300,000 on lobbying last year, up from about $100,000 in 2008, according to congressional disclosures.
The NFL also stepped up its lobbying, spending $1.4 million last year, compared with about $1 million in 2008. The league in 2008 hired a full-time lobbyist, Jeff Miller, who was an aide to Senate antitrust subcommittee Chairman Herb Kohl, a Wisconsin Democrat who owns the National Basketball Associations Milwaukee Bucks.