FLORIDA – Attorney General James Uthmeier is calling a penalty on the National Football League, claiming its policies encouraging teams to hire nonwhite coaches violate Florida’s employment laws banning discrimination.
He wrote a letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell on Wednesday warning the league’s “Rooney Rule,” which requires teams to interview an African-American or other ethnic minority for a head coaching position before making a hire is discriminatory.
“Under NFL policy, therefore, a franchise may wish to hire an experienced, highly qualified candidate, but it can’t do so for certain positions if the candidate happens to belong to a particular race. At least not immediately,” Uthmeier wrote. “These methods of directing the selection and training of certain executives, coaches, and other employees based on skin color and sex is discriminatory and violates Florida law. “
The Rooney Rule is named after the late Pittsburgh Steelers owner Dan Rooney, the uncle of former U.S. Rep. Tom Rooney. It was installed league-wide in 2003 after two Black head coaches, Tony Dungy of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Dennis Green of the Minnesota Vikings were fired despite winning tenures. Dungy was an assistant under legendary Steelers coach Chuck Noll in the 1980s.
The rule has expanded since its inception, when it was applied to Black candidates for coaching jobs, to now cover all ethnic minorities and all senior football operations positions within a franchise. In 2022 it...
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