Vince McMahon and the WWE are facing a lawsuit brought about by an ex-writer for the company. The former employee alleges that the company mistreated and wrongfully terminated her for opposing their racist storyline pitches.
Britney Abrahams began working with the WWE in 2020 and wrote for WWE SmackDown! and WWE Monday Night Raw. During that time, she received scripts that encouraged wrestlers, namely Bianca Belair and Apollo Crews, to lean into racial stereotypes.
Specifically, Belair was told to say “Uh-Uh! Don’t make me take off my earrings and beat your a**!” and Crews was told to use a “stereotypical and exaggerated Nigerian accent.” At one point, a Muslim wrestler was written to act as a character who had a secret; the secret being that he was responsible for the tragic 9/11 attacks. These pitches all appeared in a Slack thread that McMahon and his daughter, Stephanie McMahon, were part of.
Britney Abrahams and other writers expressed their disapproval of the ideas, to which they were allegedly told “Wacky things are said in the writer’s room all the time!” by Vice President Christine Lubrano. Abrahams was ultimately fired in April 2022 and was told it was because she took home a Wrestlemania-branded chair. Allegedly, that behavior was common among WWE employees and no white male writers had been fired for it.
Abrahams is seeking reinstatement, damages, declaratory judgment, and an injunction restraining defendants from engaging in such unlawful conduct.
This lawsuit comes following Vince McMahon’s own controversies within the company surrounding rape and sexual assault. The former CEO retired back in July 2022, only to reinstate himself in recent months to assist in WWE’s sale to Endeavor.