(Bloomberg) — Saudi Arabia-financed LIV Golf denied allegations that it’s using a US antitrust lawsuit against PGA Tour Inc. to “build an intelligence file” on families of 9/11 victims who have been critical of the kingdom and its new professional golf circuit.
(Bloomberg) — Saudi Arabia-financed LIV Golf denied allegations that it’s using a US antitrust lawsuit against PGA Tour Inc. to “build an intelligence file” on families of 9/11 victims who have been critical of the kingdom and its new professional golf circuit.
The PGA’s public-relations firm, Clout Public Affairs, made the claim about LIV in a court document last week to “create sensational sound bites for the media,” LIV said in a response filed Tuesday in Washington. Clout isn’t a party to the antitrust case, but is fighting a related subpoena from LIV.
LIV said the PGA and its PR firm are working together to damage Saudi Arabia’s character.
“LIV’s position is not that Saudi Arabia had a ‘pristine’ reputation in the United States,” LIV said in the filing. “LIV’s position is that the Tour adopted anticompetitive measures to preserve its monopoly by invoking specific, anti-LIV opposition that the Tour itself secretly fomented through its agent, Clout.”
LIV sued Clout last month to enforce a subpoena for the firm’s communications with another Clout client, 9/11 Justice, arguing that such records will bolster its claim that the PGA is wrongfully coordinating with victims’ families in a “smear campaign” to damage the Saudi circuit’s reputation.
It’s the latest twist in a bitter antitrust clash between the PGA and the Saudi upstart, which has divided professional players and raised thorny political questions. LIV alleges the PGA is a monopolist bent on destroying a new rival, while the PGA claims LIV is competing unfairly by luring players with “astronomical sums of money” to breach their PGA contracts — with the goal of “sportswashing” Saudi Arabia’s history of human-rights abuses.
A hearing in the antitrust case, which is playing out in California, is set for Friday. No hearing has been set in the separate fight over LIV’s subpoena to Clout.
Read More: Saudi-Backed LIV Tour Makes PGA Winnings Look Like Chump Change
“Clout and the 9/11 families have nothing to do with this antitrust and tortious interference case about golf,” PGA lawyer Elliot Peters said in an email Tuesday responding to LIV’s filing in the subpoena fight.
Clout’s lawyer, Edward D. Greim, declined to comment. Clout’s court filing last week alleged that LIV’s subpoena was far too broad and would cover communications and records about 9/11 families that are far beyond the PGA dispute.
Terror Lawsuit
The 9/11 victims’ group is involved in a separate suit against Saudi Arabia related to the 2001 terror attacks and other atrocities, including the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Clout’s filing last week claimed that LIV issued the subpoena in the PGA case as part of a broader effort to gather personal information that could identify members of 9/11 Justice and a related group that isn’t a Clout client, putting them at risk of hacking.
In its response Tuesday, LIV called that claim “shameful.”
“Clout’s allegations that LIV and its counsel seek to discover information about groups affiliated with 9/11 victims so the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia can spy on and harass them is an affront to this Court, to LIV, and to its counsel,” LIV said in the filing. “It lacks any conceivable merit.”
Brett Eagleson, the president of 9/11 Justice whose father was killed in the terror attack, said there is nothing improper about the nonprofit using the PGA’s public-relations firm. The Connecticut-based activist said the nonprofit hired Clout specifically because of its ties to the US golf circuit. He said 9/11 Justice takes issue with US golfers playing for a circuit backed by the kingdom, but isn’t interested in the antitrust fight.
“We don’t take a position on that,” Eagleson, 36, said in a phone interview. “What angers us so much is that you have really smart people playing golf and former PGA golfers who are trying to hide under a rock and pretend that” Saudi Arabia has “done nothing wrong.”
LIV said in Tuesday’s filing that it needs to request evidence from Clout because the PGA has complicated the discovery process by moving away from electronic communications.
“The need for information from Clout is especially acute in light of the Tour’s modus operandi of interrupting texts, emails, and chats, and switching to undiscoverable telephone calls,” LIV said.
The judge is weighing LIV’s motion to compel Clout to respond to the subpoena, as well as its request to transfer the case to California.
The case is LIV Golf v. Clout Public Affairs, 22-mc-00126, US District Court, District of Columbia (Washington, DC).
(Updates with comment from president of 9/11 group.)
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