Following a podcast appearance on Uncut with Jay Cutler where she expressed her misgivings towards The Walt Disney Company’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, Sage Steele has seemingly been at odds with ESPN and the entity at large. After she apologized in a statement and served a suspension, Steele noticed she had been removed from marquee assignments and subsequently filed a lawsuit against the company.
In a new report by Front Office Sports, it was revealed that Steele has been offered $501,000 by ESPN, along with covering “reasonable” attorney fees in order to settle the dispute. Steele alleges that she was forced to make the statement with a looming threat of termination, violating her rights to freedom of speech under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
“ESPN violated her free speech rights, retaliated against her, reprimanded her, scapegoated her, allowed the media and her peers to excoriate her and forced her to apologize simply because her personal opinions did not align with Disney’s corporate philosophy of the moment,” Bryan Freedman, Steele’s attorney, said in a statement when the lawsuit was filed. “Sage is standing up to corporate America to ensure employees don’t get their rights trampled on or their opinions silenced.”
Steele had initially issued a human resources complaint with ESPN, upon which she was offered a chance to host The Masters Tournament. Steele’s attorneys hold those actions to be “a blatant admission of liability” and was an impetus for the lawsuit.
Moreover, recently promoted ESPN executive editor and head of event and studio production Norby Williamson checked in with Steele to make sure she was okay after the proceedings, but expressed how she had “whacked the company.” Another former ESPN staffer tried to get a contentious response from Steele after asking colleagues how they felt about the situation.
The trial for Steele’s lawsuit is set to begin in March 2024 after the plaintiff and defendant entered non-binding mediation this past March. The filing was issued last Wednesday to the Hartford Superior Court and obtained by Front Office Sports.
