The following article was originally published with RealSport on December 11, 2016.
Earlier this week, we reported that former WWE CEO Linda McMahon had been selected by US President-Elect Donald Trump to head the Small Business Administration. The reaction has been…mixed. On the surface, she seems like a logical choice when considering her experience in the business world. Once you scratch at all past that surface, cracks begin to form and the reasons seem to fade away. Linda McMahon essentially bought the position, and her track record shows a complete disregard for small business competition.
A Little Quid Pro Quo
Let’s start with the most blatant conflict. Throughout the 2016 Election, then-candidate Trump built a significant portion of his campaign rhetoric on criticizing his opponent’s history of “quid pro quo” actions. Trump’s opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was the focal point of attacks that alleged she was accepting donations to the Clinton Foundation in return for political favors and access. While there was some basis to the claims, charges were never pursued due to lack of evidence.
For a little background, the Clinton Foundation is a nonprofit founded by former President Bill Clinton. Despite the fact that the Clinton Foundation has been widely respected for its work in tackling the AIDS epidemic and supplying anti-malarial drugs in Africa, there continues to be heavy criticism of potential conflicts of interest during Hillary Clinton’s time as Secretary of State. It still maintains a rating of 94.74 from widely respected charity watchdog Charity Navigator.
The issue seems to have faded away since President-Elect Trump’s victory last month, but it bears an uncanny parallel to the sudden choice of Linda McMahon. While Trump and McMahon have been longtime friends, it is her major campaign contributions that are coming under fire. Not only did McMahon donate $6 million to the group Rebuilding America Now over the summer, but it has now been disclosed that she made a last-minute donation of $1 million in October to the group Future 45. Both groups were heavily involved in television advertising and propaganda to assist Donald Trump in ultimately winning the election.
It seems to have been a wise investment considering her newfound position, and a better use of money than the $100 million she wasted in two unsuccessful campaigns for US Senate in Connecticut. Trump’s many business conflicts have already eroded confidence in the integrity of the very office he is soon to hold, and this choice shows blatant hypocrisy at the very top. Trump appears to be filling his government based on loyalty and wealth, rather than qualifications.
Just Kill the Competition
As corporations continue to grow throughout the world, small businesses struggle. Monopolies begin to form, and it becomes nearly impossible for their smaller counterparts to compete. Linda McMahon is a terrible choice to combat this because it is the very tactic which turned the WWE into the media conglomerate it is today.
Most wrestling fans look back fondly on the Attitude Era, the golden age in the late 1990s where competition and quality was way up between the World Wrestling Federation and World Championship Wrestling. Competition is always a good thing for business, and it was that very environment that produced legends such as “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and created unforgettable factions like the nWo.
While Linda could be praised for her position as President of WWE and eventually CEO during that time, it is the company’s actions at the end of the Attitude Era that raise eyebrows. After a hard fought ratings battle, the WWE began to pull away in the ratings. WCW shook things up a little too much, and a perfect storm seemed to come to fruition causing the company to struggle.
Seeing their prime competition on life support, the WWE, led by Vince McMahon and then-CEO Linda McMahon decided to pull the plug and create their own wrestling monopoly. WCW was purchased out from under the company’s former president, Eric Bischoff, and the WWE gained sole ownership of their trademarks, talent, media library. Essentially everything worth having was gone.
Around the same time, Extreme Championship Wrestling was struggling in their own ways with a “catch-22” scenario brewing between television companies and pay-per-view providers. Essentially, the pay-per-view distributors wouldn’t pay ECW until they had a television deal, and they couldn’t get out of debt and acquire a television deal until they were paid. Yet again, the McMahons swept in and took over ECW.
It might sound brutal, but it’s just how the McMahon family does business. Vince McMahon used the same tactic in the 1980s when he began to procure talent from smaller promotions slowly put them out of business. In an interview with Sports Illustrated, McMahon said:
“In the old days, there were wrestling fiefdoms all over the country, each with its own little lord in charge. Each little lord respected the rights of his neighboring little lord. No takeovers or raids were allowed. There were maybe 30 of these tiny kingdoms in the U.S. and if I hadn’t bought out my dad, there would still be 30 of them, fragmented and struggling. I, of course, had no allegiance to those little lords.”
These aggressive tactics may have benefited the wrestling industry in the long term, but they destroyed countless smaller promotions without a second thought. WWE even went so far as to include a non-compete clause in contracts to prevent competitors from working with rival promotions for sixty to ninety days after being released or leaving the company. Unfortunately for WWE, the clause is terribly difficult to enforce and was essentially nullified in 2014 by Alberto Del Rio following his departure from the company.
Will Linda McMahon be good for the SBA?
That’s the $7 million question, isn’t it? It’s hard to know for sure, but Linda McMahon has received glowing praise from almost everyone she’s worked with. Most recently, Jim Ross gave his thoughts on the situation in his personal blog.
“Excited for Linda McMahon for being named head of the Small Business Administration by President elect Donald Trump. While some took this appointment as a reason to again bombard the topic on social media with negativity, I can only say that in my 21+ years in WWE that Linda was always professional, accommodating and an effective leader with the company. I never had a bad experience with her whatsoever. I shared that experience and caught some grief over it from those less informed. This wasn’t an experience that I read about online or on some wrestling website but instead a personal experience that actually occurred to me and my family.
My wife Jan is arguably the biggest LEM supporter that I know as they bonded during my tenure in WWE and that respect still remains to this day. I choose to not to get overly political in any thing that I do, I don’t trust career politicians, but I will say that is no matter your choice of politics one should give those in question a fair chance to see what they can accomplish. Is that too much too ask? For some, indeed it is.”
Personally, I’ve been a steadfast critic of President-Elect Trump since before he even garnered the nomination of the Republican Party. Since Trump’s victory, I have tried to go into things with an open mind and give people a chance. I truly hope Linda McMahon is sincere in her desire to help small businesses, but despite praise from past associates, her track record does not work in her favor. In many ways, she seems completely contrary to the very purpose of the organization she’s been chosen to run, and that is what is most worrying.
Since his victory speech, President-Elect Trump has done little to attempt to unite the country, and his selections to run key government institutions go against the very existence of the agencies they could lead. He chose someone against the Fair Housing Act to run the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He chose someone against public schools to run the Department of Education. He chose someone that is suing the EPA over climate change to run the EPA. He chose someone against minimum wage increases to lead the Department of Labor. It’s being reported he’ll pick someone with no government or diplomatic experience to be Secretary of State, and be the chief diplomat for the country.
Viewed in a vacuum, the choice of Linda McMahon could be a hopeful one considering the respect she receives from former colleagues and her own personal experience in the business world. Viewed with the totality of the circumstances, Linda McMahon represents yet another tragic decision by a corrupt fraud who, unfortunately, will be the 45th President of the United States of America.
