Photo Credit: Soheb Zaidi
Entertainment executive Tim Leiweke got a full pardon from Trump just weeks after his attorney played a round of golf with the president at Mar-a-Lago.
Mounting legal and political drama surround Oak View Group (OVG) founder and former CEO Tim Leiweke, who received a full pardon from President Trump for his alleged crimes of bid-rigging and ticketing kickbacks. Now, the entertainment mogul refuses to cooperate as a witness in the government’s antitrust case against Live Nation and Ticketmaster, intermingling the ongoing trouble across Live Nation’s market dominance, DOJ scrutiny of the matter, and OVG’s own laid-bare problems.
Tim Leiweke was indicted by a federal grand jury after an investigation by Trump’s own DOJ revealed he was allegedly conspiring to rig the bidding process for a deal for the now-constructed Moody Center at the University of Texas at Austin. Almost immediately, he received a full and unconditional pardon from President Trump.
The pardon was facilitated by Trump ally and former congressman Trey Gowdy after he and the president played a round of golf at Mar-a-Lago. Trump allegedly asked Gowdy if there was anything he could help him with, according to the Wall Street Journal, whereby Gowdy brought up Leiweke. Three weeks after the alleged game, Trump pardoned Leiweke.
“I am extremely grateful that the president allowed me to raise that issue with him, and he is the president, and whatever decision was made after that, he was elected to make; I was not,” Gowdy told the WSJ.
But that pardon directly undermines Trump’s own Justice Department’s criminal case against Leiweke to the tune of around $375 million. It also hinders a related civil case honed in on Live Nation/Ticketmaster, stemming from competition and pricing in live events.
Now, Leiweke has refused to answer questions from the DOJ regarding the antitrust case against Live Nation and Ticketmaster. He invoked his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination during a deposition last week, Bloomberg reports.
The timing of Leiweke’s refusal to testify isn’t irrelevant. Both Leiweke and OVG feature heavily in the evidence that underpins Live Nation’s antitrust power, according to federal regulators. Key aspects of the DOJ’s civil complaint, as well as documents unearthed during the investigation, portray OVG as a “critical cog” in Live Nation’s strategy to further entrench Ticketmaster’s hold on the industry.
Back in July, exhibits attached to OVG’s non-prosecution agreement revealed that Ticketmaster paid the company a $20 million upfront “incentive,” followed by $7 million annually. In exchange, OVG’s venue-management arm, OVG360, pressured arenas to sign or maintain exclusive Ticketmaster contracts without disclosing that OVG was receiving related kickbacks.
Further, the government posits that OVG was directly positioned to be a legitimate threat to the status quo, but instead aligned with Live Nation to protect the juggernaut’s market share.
Since OVG appears throughout the government’s allegations, Leiweke is one of the few individuals with direct knowledge of both the company’s internal strategy and its dealings with Live Nation. His testimony could have been a smoking gun for the DOJ’s case—but now the government may never get his account on record, thanks to his invocation of the Fifth Amendment and his criminal charges gone.
Meanwhile, Leiweke may not be getting his position back—or any position—at OVG, but the longtime industry executive says he plans to start a new company and purchase another sports team.
“I’m going to do it again,” he told the WSJ. “I’m not dead yet.”
