Nick Khan Seen Interacting With Fans at WWE Royal Rumble Store When Vince McMahon Resignation Dropped

– As previously reported, former TKO Executive Chairman of the Board Vince McMahon resigned from his post yesterday in light of the recent allegations and lawsuit against him. McMahon has been accused of sex trafficking, emotional and physical abuse, sexual assault, and more in a lawsuit filed by former employee Janel Grant on Thursday. PWInsider has an update on WWE President Nick Khan being seen at the WWE Royal Rumble Superstore in Tampa, Florida shortly before the news dropped.

According to the report, a short time before the resignation was made public, Nick Khan was in the Royal Rumble store, and he was said to be taking photos with fans at the Superstore in Tampa. As noted, WWE removed a Vince McMahon t-shirt celebrating his 1999 Royal Rumble win that was being sold in the Superstore this week. McMahon was also removed from WWE and TKO’s website listings.

In January 2023, Nick Khan said the following on Vince McMahon returning to the company, while “applauding” McMahon for the way he exercised his authority as a controlling shareholder of WWE:

“From the inside, it’s not that insane to me. But it’s also, you know, the word ‘insider.’ When you’re on the inside, you see things that may be coming. My thought was that there’s only one boss in the company, and that ain’t me. Vince is obviously the founder, creator of the company. He’s also the controlling shareholder… so I think it was always my point of view, always Stephanie’s point of view, at some point, he would come back.

“I think the way he played it, to me was smart in that he went away for five, six months. Which people, meaning the audience, seems to like when somebody does that. And he came back and took control back of his company as the controlling shareholder. So it is the public’s company, it’s a publicly traded company. But with that controlling share, [it] gave him a lot of authority. And he used it, and I applaud him for doing so.”

McMahon previously retired from WWE as Chairman in July 2022 following the release of the initial reports by The Wall Street Journal after allegations of sexual misconduct with a former WWE employee, who was later revealed to be Janel Grant, and he also allegedly agreed to pay over $12 million in hush money to four different women over the last 16 years. It’s alleged the payments were to keep allegations of sexual misconduct and infidelity quiet.