More On Vince McMahon Investigation: WWE Issues Staff Message, Note On How Much Voting Power McMahons Control

WWE has reportedly sent staff a statement regarding the investigation into Vince McMahon’s alleged $3 million payment over an affair. As noted earlier, the Wall Street Journal reported that the WWE Board of Directors is investigating an alleged $3 million payment made to a former employee he allegedly had a sexual relationship with in January of 2022, and that the investigation has reportedly uncovered other and older NDAs that involve claims of misconduct made by former WWE employees against McMahon as well as WWE Head of Talent Relations John Laurinaitis.

Wrestlenomics’ Brandon Thurston reports that WWE sent staff a message that read:

“The Wall Street Journal has published a report about WWE with allegations that we and our Board of Directors take seriously.

We are cooperating fully with the independent investigation initiated by our Board of Directors.”

In addition, Thurston notes that while Vince McMahon owns only about 37.6% of company stock, due to the fact that his shares are mostly class B shares he has 80.6% of the company’s voting power. Class B shares of stock have ten times the voting power of class A shares. Stephanie McMahon and Linda McMahon also both mostly own class B shares and so despite only owning about 2.5% and 0.7% of company stock respectively, Stephanie and Linda have 5.2% and 1.6% voting power.

"We are cooperating fully with the independent investigation initiated by our Board of Directors."

— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) June 15, 2022

As of March, Vince McMahon controls about 80% of WWE voting power despite owning just over one-third of the company.

Shares held by Vince, Linda, and Stephanie are mostly class B shares which give each of their shares 10x voting power over class A shares held by all others. pic.twitter.com/bRwQiELP9a

— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) June 15, 2022