WWE sex abuse suit raises concerns ahead of Linda McMahon's hearing to run Education Dept.
As Linda McMahon is set to face a confirmation hearing Thursday to lead the Education Department, several former WWE employees, their family members and two current and former education officials are raising concerns about whether she is fit for the position overseeing more than 50 million students in about 98,000 public schools and 32,000 private schools around the United States.
As Linda McMahon is set to face a confirmation hearing Thursday to lead the Education Department, several former WWE employees, their family members and two current and former education officials are raising concerns about whether she is fit for the position overseeing more than 50 million students in about 98,000 public schools and 32,000 private schools around the United States.
At issue, these people say, is her commitment to safeguarding children and overseeing Title IX, which protects students against discrimination, amid allegations in an October lawsuit that she was involved in turning a blind eye to child sex abuse at the hands of a World Wrestling Entertainment employee during her tenure as an executive at WWE. An attorney for McMahon has denied the claims. McMahon isn’t accused of sexual abuse.
“I’ve had many friends who have their own histories and their own traumas with sexual assault that have reached out and said, ‘This is a slap in the face,’” Kristina Ishmael, an Education Department official in the Biden administration, told NBC News.
A current Education Department employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of fear of losing her job said she also had concerns about McMahon’s competence to lead the department because of her involvement in the lawsuit and lack of education experience.
The lawsuit accused McMahon and her husband, WWE co-founder Vince McMahon, of enabling the sexual abuse and exploitation of children, known as “ring boys,” by a WWE ring announcer decades ago.
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