Vince McMahon reported personal payments now equal over $19M

Through bombshell reporting from The Wall Street Journal, the world now knows that former WWE CEO and Chairman, Vince McMahon, paid $12 million in hush payments to four women. A new report from Variety says the payments actually total $19.6 million. According to Dave Meltzer, the additional payments went to two people in 2007 and 2009.

On Tuesday, the WWE made an SEC filing that disclosed the additional payments. The payments were discovered while the company was revising financial statements going back to 2019. According to Variety, the two payments are “unrelated to the allegations that led to the board’s special committee investigations.” The latest discovery is causing WWE to delay its upcoming quarterly report.

A timeline of the Vince McMahon investigation

On June 15, WSJ released the initial article about McMahon’s hush payments. McMahon claimed to have a consensual affair with a former WWE employee to whom he paid $3 million. Her friend suggests otherwise about it being consensual. In this same report, former WWE Head of Talent Relations John Laurinaitis was also implicated in an affair with the same woman.

Stephanie McMahon was named interim CEO and Chairwoman by WWE on June 17. On July 6, WWE board member, Connor Schell, resigned. He claims that it was unrelated to the ongoing investigation.

On July 8, the second WSJ article revealed that it was, in fact, four women who received hush money that totaled $12 million. Even more explosive allegations came out. One of the women was forced to perform oral sex on McMahon. When she refused to continue a sexual relationship, she was demoted, and later, her contract wasn’t renewed. In 2006, a former manager was paid $1 million to keep quiet about a decade-long sexual affair she had with the former CEO. Two years later, another woman was paid almost $1 million after she presented nude photos of McMahon that she received unsolicited. She was also sexually harassed while working.

Two weeks later, Vince McMahon tweeted that he was retiring. A press release from WWE’s corporate site confirmed the news. Earlier that day, WWE announced that Paul “HHH” Levesque was the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations. Three days later, Levesque took over creative.

With Vince’s retirement, Stephanie and Nick Khan were named co-CEOs. Yesterday (August 8), PW Insider reported that Laurinaitis had been “quietly released in the last week or so.”

This is an ongoing story. Stay tuned to Daily DDT for the latest.