Feb 13 (Reuters) – A federal judge overseeing Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator Brian Flores’ racial discrimination lawsuit against the National Football League ruled on Friday that the claims can be heard in open court, reversing a prior order sending the case into closed-door arbitration controlled by the league.
U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni in Manhattan said the NFL’s unilateral control was a “fatal flaw” because it did not let Flores and two other plaintiff coaches effectively vindicate their rights.
“Arbitration of these claims should not be compelled,” Caproni wrote.
The decision followed an August 2025 ruling from the federal appeals court in Manhattan, which said a provision in the NFL constitution granting Commissioner Roger Goodell unilateral authority to arbitrate was “plainly unenforceable” because it would deny Flores arbitration “in any meaningful sense of the word.”
Neither the NFL nor lawyers for the league and several teams named as defendants immediately responded to requests for comment.
“The court’s decision recognizes that an arbitration forum in which the defendant’s own chief executive gets to decide the case would strip employees of their rights under the law,” Flores’ lawyers Douglas Wigdor and David Gottlieb said in a joint statement. “It is long overdue for the NFL to recognize this and finally provide a fair, neutral and transparent forum.”
Flores, 44, who is Black, sued the NFL in February 2022, saying he was subjected to “sham” interviews for head coaching positions so teams could comply with diversity recruiting requirements under the league’s Rooney Rule. He has spent the last three seasons in charge of the Vikings defense.
Former Arizona Cardinals head coach Steve Wilks and former NFL assistant coach Ray Horton, who are both Black, joined the case as plaintiffs in April 2022.
The proposed class action alleged systemic discrimination against Black candidates for top coaching and management jobs.
Other defendants included the New York Giants and Houston Texans, which interviewed Flores soon after he was fired as Miami Dolphins head coach in January 2022, and the Denver Broncos, which interviewed him before he joined Miami in 2019.
(Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto; Additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Bill Berkrot)
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