USSF presidential candidate Hope Solo has filed a complaint with the US Olympic Committee against US Soccer itself. We’re here to walk you through the complaint, which alleges that USSF has “become blinded to its fundamental obligation...” as the governing body of soccer in the United States.
What is this about?
Hope Solo has filed a complaint with the United States Olympic Committee against US Soccer alleging that USSF essentially only really pays attention to MLS to the detriment of all other aspects of the game that USSF is supposed to control as the national governing body of the sport. That means, among other things, not supporting leagues like NASL and NWSL, mishandling the development of youth players, and neglecting differently abled players. Solo’s complaint says that USSF does this because the federation has an “institutional bias” towards MLS, as well as Soccer United Marketing, from which “power, prestige, status, and money” flow. The complaint also says that institutional bias reaches an impermissible level in USSF’s ability to make independent decisions.
What basis does Solo have for filing a complaint?
Solo is using the Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act, which is a federal law that sets out the requirements for the national governing bodies of sports in this country. In particular she cites §220524, which lists the general duties of governing bodies, and says that USSF has failed to “develop interest and participation through the United States and be responsible to the persons and amateur sports organizations it represents.”
Solo’s complaint alleges USSF is not “free from outside restraint,” doesn’t provide “reasonable direct representation” on its board for all the major stakeholder groups besides MLS, fails to be “financially and operationally transparent,” does not “provide equitable support and encouragement for participation by women” and does not support programs for differently-abled players.
Why go to the USOC?
The Stevens Act says that a person who belongs to or is eligible to belong to a national governing body (USSF in this case) can file a complaint with the USOC. Solo has shown that by fulfilling the criteria to run for president, she is eligible to belong to USSF.
Solo’s complaint further states that the USOC was the only place this complaint could go because there was no remedy available to this problem within US Soccer. USSF’s internal remedy with respect to grievances relating to their status as an NGB is to go to arbitration, and going to arbitration would “result in unnecessary delay.” Furthermore, the complaint argues that USSF shouldn’t even go to arbitration about governance complaints in the first place, because the Stevens Act requires NGB’s not to “delegate decision-making and control of matters central to governance.”
What’s the evidence they’re presenting?
The complaint really hammers at the connections between USSF, MLS, and SUM as evidence that USSF only cares about MLS. It claims that because USSF is entwined with SUM on a business level, that the relationship “infects the decision-making process at USSF.” It also points out “one-third of the voting members of the USSF’s Board have an existing or prior employment or other business relationship with the MLS or its business partner, the United Soccer League....”
SUM markets broadcast rights for national team games on behalf of USSF and bundles those rights with media rights for MLS games. The complaint argues that this exclusive relationship a) means there’s no proper competition to get the most possible money out of those media rights and b) ignores other men’s and women’s leagues when they bundle rights. And SUM’s CEO is, of course Don Garber, also MLS commissioner and member of the USSF board of directors.
The complaint also mentions NASL’s antitrust case against USSF, as well as the folding of the Boston Breakers, a founding member of NWSL, as evidence that USSF doesn’t really care about leagues other than MLS.
On top of it all, USSF is compromised by a lack of transparency, with outdated conflict-of-interest policies and important decision-making done in private “executive sessions,” e.g. the board renewing its agreement with SUM in 2014 in an executive session, but federation members receiving no advance notice such a renewal was under consideration.
And in particular, the complaint calls out Kathy Carter for her ties to SUM, lack of disclosure about her financial interests, and the (not unjustified) assumption Carter would run USSF like a business, as opposed to focusing on the soccer side. Carter being backed by Gulati and Garber is, the complaint asserts, further evidence of SUM’s inappropriate influence over USSF. There’s some paragraphs for Carlos Cordeiro as well, describing him as “the consummate insider” who never spoke about conflicts of interest due to SUM until he decided to run for president.
The USSF/SUM relationship isn’t the only target; the complaint also talks about things like the lack of solidarity payments to benefit youth clubs, the prohibitively high cost of coach licensing, lack of pathway for differently-abled players to reach the Paralympics, and neglect in recruiting Latino or Hispanic players for the NT as further evidence the federation has neglected women’s, youth, and amateur soccer.
There’s also this kicker: “For a nation of 300 million to fail to field a team that can participate in the past two Summer Olympics or to qualify for the 2018 World Cup despite playing in the least competitive region in the entire world is prima facie evidence of the USSF’s inadequacy as U.S. soccer’s national governing body.”
What does Solo want from USSF?
The complaint lays out several items in its request for relief:
- USOC declares USSF is in violation of USOC bylaws and the Stevens Act
- USOC puts USSF on probation for 180 days, during which time USSF must correct its USOC and Stevens Act violations
- USSF pays all costs incurred by Solo in bringing the action
- whatever other relief the USOC “deems just and equitable”
How likely is it the USOC will rule against USSF?
The complaint claims that USSF has failed its duty to “develop interest and participation [in its sport] throughout the United States and be responsible to the persons and amateur sports organizations it represents.” The claim cites things like missing the 2018 World Cup, an NWSL team folding, lack of investment in and attention to non-MLS leagues, and exorbitant costs for youth soccer. But because “interest and participation” covers a lot, USSF has room to argue for its own metrics on what constitutes success here. They could point to their $150M surplus as evidence they have certainly developed interest in the game. And qualifying for tournaments or otherwise winning on the field isn’t actually in the general duties of a governing body.
(Pause to note here, why doesn’t the claim point to the stagnation of youth soccer registration? An Aspen Institute study showed that children who play soccer on a regular basis declined from just over 3M in 2010 to 2.3M in 2016. And U.S. Youth Soccer’s membership stats show registration numbers have been relatively static from 2000 - 2014.)
The complaint does have a point that even if USSF is developing the sport, it’s not doing it for everyone. But USSF could argue that with the presidential election upcoming and USSF currently in a state of reflection after the MNT failure to qualify for the World Cup, they haven’t had a chance to properly invest their surplus. Just because they haven’t started doling out that money to youth soccer and NWSL doesn’t mean they won’t.
The USOC will also have to consider the allegation that USSF is impermissibly influenced by outside groups, namely how closely entangled it is with MLS and SUM, which prevents it from acting in a truly independent manner. USSF might argue here that even though there are a percentage of MLS- or USL-affiliated voters, they don’t control a majority of votes. In the complaint’s own figures, it cites MLS controlling 14% of votes in the presidential election, which is not actually a “substantial portion” of the 50% + one vote needed to win.
So it turns out there’s plenty of wiggle room for USSF arguments and it’s not a given that the USOC will drop the hammer on the federation. But that doesn’t mean Solo hasn’t made a very public policy argument about many of USSF’s shortcomings - an argument that does raise important points about who benefits from USSF and why. One suspects that with her hat in the presidential race, that that is just as much a motivating factor as any possible chance of USOC sanctions. And honestly, that’s fine. Having a candidate in the race who forces all the other candidates to confront questions about parts of US Soccer they might not have otherwise considered is not a bad thing. Raising public awareness of issues dealing with governance of American soccer is not a bad thing either. So even if this ultimately gets rejected by the USOC, Solo is only really out the cost of bringing the complaint, and she probably considers it worth it.