CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The daughter-in-law of Michael Jordan and Joe Gibbs was scheduled to testify Friday, the fifth day of the federal antitrust case filed by the Basketball Hall of Fame against NASCAR over allegations the series acted like monopolistic bullies.
Heather Gibbs, chief operating officer of Joe Gibbs Racing, wrote an impassioned letter to NASCAR President Jim France in May 2024, imploring him to make the charters permanent in an effort to strengthen the family business.
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Charters are the equivalent of the franchise model used in other sports and in NASCAR, they guarantee each rented car a place in all 38 races, plus a set payment from NASCAR. The system was created in 2016 and, during more than two years of tough negotiations over an expansion, teams requested that the renewable charters become permanent.
When NASCAR refused to make them permanent and gave teams six hours in September 2024 to sign the 112-page extension, 23XI and Front Row Motorsports were the only two organizations out of 15 to refuse and instead filed an antitrust suit.
23XI is owned by Jordan and three-time Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin, and Front Row is owned by fast-food franchiser Bob Jenkins.
The discovery phase of the trial revealed a letter sent by Heather Gibbs to France, who is now president of the series founded by her father 76 years ago.
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“We have dedicated 32 years to investing and building a dream, building careers, raising families, and building NASCAR. If the financial model made sense, we would not have had to work with an outside investor,” she wrote. “If our teams were in good financial health and not solely dependent on sponsorship, I would sleep better at night, not worrying about the passing of the torch.
“We have invested not only our time but also our family in this sport. We have raised champions and buried their leaders, while continuing to embrace the historic roots of NASCAR,” she continued in the emotional two-page letter. “So, with all due respect, understand that when you tell us that it makes no sense to collaborate with us after 7 years, it is depressing and really disappointing.”
The letter came up Thursday during testimony by NASCAR Chairman Steve O’Donnell, who was called as an adverse witness. O’Donnell said in a text message to Ben Kennedy, Jim France’s nephew, “Jim is now reading Heather’s letter out loud and swearing every other sentence.”
Pressed by plaintiffs’ attorney Jeffrey Kessler about what France was saying when he read the letter, O’Donnell said the president never swore. Kessler tried to force O’Donnell to reconcile what he had written to Kennedy, but O’Donnell maintained that his boss did not swear.
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“That’s what I wrote, but he didn’t do it,” O’Donnell testified. “We were all surprised by the letter. I think Jim was frustrated, as we all were.”
Joe Gibbs ultimately signed the charter agreement, but Jenkins said the rival team’s owner apologized for doing so.
On Thursday, Kessler tried to present France as “a brick wall” in the negotiations. The teams had made specific demands to try to improve their financial situation, but the deal that was ultimately offered to them on the eve of the start of the 2024 playoffs did not meet most of their demands.
NASCAR was founded in 1948 by the late Bill France Sr. and to this day is owned by a private family based in Florida. Jim France is his youngest son.
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Kessler had a contentious, more than three-hour session with O’Donnell and at times yelled at the executive. He used internal communications among NASCAR executives to demonstrate the frustration of non-French family members with the slow pace of negotiations and Jim France’s refusal to grant permanent charters to the teams.
Internal communications between the leaders showed growing frustration with the protracted negotiations. As O’Donnell, Commissioner Steve Phelps and others tried to find concessions for the teams, they all indicated they repeatedly encountered resistance from France and his niece, Vice President Lesa France Kennedy.
“Mr. France was the brick wall in the negotiations,” Kessler told O’Donnell.
“Those are your words, not mine,” the leader responded.
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Earlier Thursday, O’Donnell said teams had contacted the sanctioning body in early 2022 to request an improved revenue model, arguing the system was unsustainable.
O’Donnell was present at the meeting with representatives from four teams, who requested that the negotiating window on a new charter deal open earlier because they were fighting for financial survival. The negotiation window was not due to open until July 2023.
O’Donnell testified that during that first meeting, four-time series champion Jeff Gordon, now vice president of Hendrick Motorsports, asked specifically if the France family was “open to a new model.”
Kennedy, great-grandson of the founder of NASCAR, said yes to Gordon.
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But O’Donnell said President France was opposed to a new revenue model.
The expansions that began this year increased the guaranteed amount for each leased car to $12.5 million in annual revenue, up from $9 million. Both Hamlin and Jenkins said it costs $20 million to bring a single car to the track for all 38 races. That figure doesn’t include overhead, operating costs or driver pay, and Jenkins admitted he doesn’t spend that much.
NASCAR argued that it had made huge improvements for the teams while striving to grow the sport. O’Donnell testified that NASCAR lost $55 million in the three years it held a race on the streets of downtown Chicago, and $6 million during its June race in Mexico City. But he said these events were key to growing the audience and establishing Amazon as a media partner.
“It was a strategic investment because without it, Amazon would not have become a distribution partner,” he testified.
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Judge Kenneth Bell chastised both sides for the slow pace of the trial, which was initially scheduled to last two weeks. Kessler said he doesn’t expect to finish the team until the middle of next week.
NASCAR plans to call Roger Penske as a witness. Penske, who was reluctant to testify, said he was not available until next Monday. Christopher Yates, lead attorney for NASCAR, requested that Penske be allowed to testify that day, but Kessler objected because it would disrupt the flow of his presentation.
Bell sided with Kessler and told NASCAR to settle the issue with Penske because “federal testing is an inconvenience.”
The judge also said that extending the trial to three weeks was not acceptable, and while he was reluctant to intervene to speed up the pace, he urged both sides to advise their witnesses to stop being “reluctant to answer even the most innocuous questions.”
