Six former employees of the team formerly known as the Washington Football Team attended a roundtable Thursday on Capitol Hill, describing a toxic workplace culture where sexual misconduct was rampant.
Rachel Engleson, who worked for the team now called the Commanders for eight years, told the House Committee on Oversight and Reform that she “can’t recall a time that I didn’t experience or fear sexual harassment.”
“It was just a pervasive part of the culture and an unavoidable rite of passage being a woman who worked there,” she told lawmakers. “I experienced many work firsts there: First bonus, first promotion, first office potluck, first employee hire, first threat of physical violence by a supervisor, first hostile work environment, first public humiliation, first sexual assault.”
In 2020, The Washington Post first reported an array of harassment allegations from dozens of former employers. An investigation was launched by the NFL that same year, but the findings from that probe have yet to be made public. During the roundtable, a new allegation was also brought forward against the team’s owner, Dan Snyder.
Tiffani Johnston, an employee on the team until 2008, said that Snyder harassed her at a work dinner by placing his hand on her thigh and then later pushed her toward his limo.
Following Thursday’s roundtable, Snyder apologized for past misconduct on the team, adding that allegations “leveled against me personally in today’s roundtable — many of which are well over 13 years old — are outright lies.”
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