The former coach of the Miami Dolphins filed a lawsuit Tuesday that accused the NFL and several teams of race discrimination in hiring practices, claiming that despite its stated commitment to racial equity, the league “remains rife with racism.”
The suit brought by Brian Flores, who is Black, comes just weeks after he was fired by the Dolphins, and later subjected to what he described as a sham interview with the New York Giants, conducted only to pay lip service to the league’s racial diversity guidelines.
“In certain critical ways, the NFL is racially segregated and is managed much like a plantation,” reads the complaint. “Its 32 owners — none of whom are Black — profit substantially from the labor of NFL players, 70% of whom are Black.”
The lawsuit is just the latest high-profile charge of racism leveled against the league. The NFL was also recently sued for making it tougher for Black ex-players to qualify for payments under its landmark concussion settlement by using race-based assessment criteria, resulting in the league changing its policy.
In his 58-page complaint, filed in federal court in New York, Flores claims that after years of seeing the “NFL’s disingenuous commitment to social equity,” he concluded that “the only way to effectuate real change is through the courts.”
The lawsuit alleges violations of federal civil rights law as well as New York and New Jersey state anti-discrimination law. The named defendants include the NFL, as well as the New York Giants, Miami Dolphins, Denver Broncos, and any other teams applicable to the class action suit.
Flores is being represented by the anti-discrimination law powerhouse firm Wigdor LLP, which also represented the alleged sexual abuse victims of disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein.
The NFL did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Among the claims contained in the explosive complaint is that the NFL’s “Rooney Rule,” which requires teams to interview at least one Black candidate for coaching staff vacancies, is regularly undermined by a lack of good faith on the part of management.
Following his firing last month from the Miami Dolphins — which Flores depicts as undeserved — he began interviewing with the New York Giants, where he hoped to become the franchise’s first Black head coach in its nearly 100-year history.
But in the midst of the interview process, Flores was inadvertently tipped off by New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick that a White applicant, Brian Daboll, had already been unofficially chosen for the job.
Nonetheless, Flores was still invited to participate in a dinner and extensive interview for the position — gestures which he claims were done “for no reason other than for the Giants to demonstrate falsely to the League Commissioner Roger Goodell and the public at large that it was in compliance with the Rooney Rule.”
He claims he was subjected to a similar “sham interview” in 2019 with members of the Denver Broncos management team, including hall of fame quarterback John Elway, who showed up to the meeting an hour late.
“They looked completely disheveled, and it was obvious that they had drinking heavily the night before. It was clear from the substance of the interview that Mr. Flores was interviewed only because of the Rooney Rule, and that the Broncos never had any intention to consider him as a legitimate candidate for the job,” the complaint states. “Shortly thereafter, Vic Fangio, a white man, was hired to be the Head Coach of the Broncos.”
Additionally, Flores alleges that Dolphins officials have unfairly labeled him as “someone who was difficult to work with,” which he describes in the lawsuit as being “reflective of an all too familiar ‘angry black man’ stigma.”