War of Words: NFL Accuses Washington Commanders of Impeding Access

In a letter to the oversight committee, the league claims the resistance lives within the franchise

It's hard to keep up with everything happening surrounding the Washington Commanders these days. 

Between congressional inquiries, investigations, name changes, and team captains in trouble on social media and in the court of law, it's easy to forget there's football to be concerned with as well. 

Photo by Rob Carr/Getty Images

The NFL Draft is just around the corner, and instead of diving into scouting reports and mock drafts, we're spending hours upon hours digging through government documents and official letters.

Like the one the NFL sent to the House Committee on Oversight stating the Washington franchise is the entity impeding access to documents related to the previous investigation into the organization, not the league.

"The team has insisted that it will only authorize the vendor to release those documents to the team," the letter states. "So that the team's counsel can review the documents for privilege first...before deciding unilaterally which documents it will provide to the NFL for production to the Committee. The NFL viewed this as an unacceptable approach because it would prevent the NFL from ensuring that it can produce all responsive, non-privileged documents to the Committee and would delay our production decisions."

A lot of the conflict between the Committee and the NFL and Washington Commanders franchise resides in the common interest agreement entered into by the league and team.

This allows lawyers representing both the league and the team to share information from the investigation into the team without it being considered a breach of attorney-client privilege. 

According to the letter sent by league representatives, the NFL says the Committee accused it of withdrawing from the agreement in order to "create a legal limbo" in which the Committee would be unable to obtain the documents they seek to receive. 

The league denies this, while stating the Commanders have put stipulations on releasing a limited portion of documents related to the investigation which the NFL then turns to the Committee for approval. 

Dan Snyder meanwhile denies the NFL's claims through his lawyer, Jordan Siev, stating, "The Commanders have never prevented the NFL from obtaining any non-privileged documents and will not do so in the future."

Essentially, both the league and the team are pointing blame at each other, while neither delivers anything the House Committee on Oversight is asking for. 

Which is an odd way of proclaiming no wrong-doing has occurred. 

More to come on this for sure...and there's an NFL Draft coming up as well. 

Stay tuned.