WWE filed a complaint earlier this month against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to keep the agreement between WWE and the City of San Antonio a secret.
Wrestlenomics reports that the agreement in question would reveal information including what San Antonio gave WWE in exchange for bringing the 2023 Royal Rumble PLE to the Alamodome. WWE says the agreement is a trade secret and contains proprietary information that fits an exemption in Texas’s public information law.
Various records were requested by Wrestlenomics last year in relation to the event. The records revealed the events ticket sales, as well as the ticket sales for the 2017 Royal Rumble, which was also held in the Alamodome.
In April 2023, city officials were granted an exemption from the state Attorney General’s office, which allowed them to withhold the bidding contract. That decision was revised in January of this year. At the time, Assistant Attorney General Michelle Garza stated:
“WWE has failed to provide specific factual evidence demonstrating the information at issue is confidential under [Texas’ public information law.]”
WWE’s Big Money Deals
Various locations have paid big money to WWE to host events in their area, which are often a massive boost to the local economy. Puerto Rico reportedly paid $1.5 million in subsidies for Backlash and SmackDown in San Juan last May.
In December, TKO COO Mark Shapiro said that TKO would be getting $16 million for a “combination of events” in Australia. That presumably includes last weekend’s Elimination Chamber 2024 event in Perth.
WWE’s biggest event-based deals come from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Since 2018, WWE has received more than $50 million per event from Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority.
