LIV Golf is suing the PGA Tour for secretly coordinating the protests. PGA should have paid families of 9/11 victims

The tough battle for a place under the golf sun is not a fought one. The PGA and the LIV are at war, a dispute that will probably have to be resolved first and foremost through legal wrangling. There’s a lot at stake, and it’s evident around every corner. Now LIV Golf has decided to sue the traditional circuit for paying 9/11 survivors to spread dirt on its competitor.

While the American continent is not the only one targeted by LIV Golf, it is no surprise that it is a bastion of professional golf. Until recently, however, this bastion was ruled for many years by the no-holds-barred PGA Tour.

However, with the advent of the LIV, the cards are changing. After a number of the world’s elite players left the PGA Tour, the PGA is aware that they are no longer alone in the limelight.

After LIV Golf kicked off its season in February this year, it was immediately met with much criticism in the political, media and fan scenes. All of them are reportedly bothered by one major issue, that the LIV is subsidised by a Saudi Arabian public fund.

Critics claim that the new golf circuit was an attempt to use a popular sport to enhance the country’s reputation, despite its history of human rights abuses and, not least, the blame for the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001.

These reasons are still published by the media today. However, LIV representatives claim that it is the PGA that is playing dirty here. That they are the ones who “in their” media use the history of Saudi Arabia against their competitors.

Now LIV representatives have decided to sue the mainstream American circuit for secretly coordinating much of this backlash against them. According to the Wall Street Journal, the PGA Tour has hired a public relations firm in Washington, D.C., to manage and fund public protests and smear ads. All to maintain its monopoly.

According to the court filing, LIV Golf alleges that the PGA Tour and the hired firm, Clout Public Affairs LLC, were behind the protests by the 9/11 survivors’ families. According to a long ago published investigation, it has been declassified that a Saudi Arabian terrorist organization led by Osama bin Laden, who was also born in that country, was behind the attacks.

The protests began with the first LIV golf tournament in the US in June and attracted considerable media attention and political support. A large group from 9/11 Families United, a community of families and survivors of the worst terrorist attacks on US soil, also gathered around the course. It was this community that the PGA Tour, with a hired PR firm, was to fund.

The legal filing alleges that the PGA Tour launched this campaign not to help the 9/11 families, but to further its campaign against the LIV Golf organization. In addition to the PGA, the defendant is also the aforementioned Clout Public Affairs firm that is supposed to be working with the PGA.

Source: The Wall Street Journal