The lawsuit filed by Janel Grant, accusing Vince McMahon of sex trafficking, cast a shadow over a week of WWE news that included Monday Night Raw shifting to Netflix starting in January 2025 and Dwayne Johnson’s addition to the TKO Board of Directors. McMahon, in response, resigned from his role as TKO executive chairman and also stepped down from its board on Friday.
All of these developments transpired before Royal Rumble premium live event on Saturday night. As is tradition after the marquee events, WWE held a post-show press conference, opening a forum for questions regarding what happened the last seven days.
During the press conference, Cody Rhodes was asked about the McMahon situation and agreed with the question phrasing that it cast a “dark cloud” (h/t Fightful for transcription).
I know as far as the news is concerned, we were finding out and reading the same things you guys were reading. You said a dark cloud, certainly. As far TKO, Nick Khan, and the board, clearly took it very seriously, acted immediately, and looking at the future, I don’t know the answer to that and I think somewhere is a really probably basic tenant of this crew, more than ever, from a roster standpoint, is very family. Never seen anything like this. Most of the time, wrestling locker rooms are fighting, talking trash about each other, making fun of each other, sandbagging each other in the ring and all that nonsense. This crew is very team-based. Perhaps that’s the ingredient, everyone looking out for everyone, being accountable. For me as a performer, I’ve been through dark periods on our industry. It might sound cheesy, but it’s very reinforcing if you’re in my position, that it’s a time when, ‘Hey, we have 50,000 people out here, I want to give them something else from this weekend that isn’t a terrible situation, terrible news.’ I think we were able to do that. Obviously, as more news comes out, we’ll be seeing it like you do.
Triple H also fielded questions about the lawsuit during his segment of the press conference.
It undeniably brought a sense of uncertainty to WWE this week, happening between two significant business announcements and the Royal Rumble. The future remains uncertain with the lawsuit filed just on Thursday, with much yet to unfold.
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