District judge shuts down 23XI and FRM’s major request in NASCAR lawsuit

It’s halfway through the 2025 season, and the antitrust saga between 23XI Racing, Front Row Motorsports, and NASCAR is still in motion. Recently, there have been new proceedings that involve the U.S. District Court Judge denying 23XI and FRM’s demands of seeking Formula 1, the NFL, NBA, NHL, and Major League Baseball’s financial documents, as per reports.

According to reports, the reason behind the refusal was simple: 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports wanted to look at how the major sports federations shared their revenues with their athletes between January 1, 2016, and December 31, 2024. Notably, NASCAR’s charter system made its official debut in 2016.

The latest news, as reported by Bob Pockrass on X (formerly known as Twitter), is that the court had denied the request. Pockrass wrote in his post,

“U.S. District Court judge in NY denies motion by 23XI/FRM to force NFL, NBA & NHL to comply with subpoena for financial info.

Listing the reasons (as stated by the Court), he added,

-It's confidential commercial info & disclosure would be harmful

-Info not relevant to case

-Much of league financial info already is public.”

Bob

Bob Pockrass

@bobpockrass

LINK

U.S. District Court judge in NY denies motion by 23XI/FRM to force NFL, NBA & NHL to comply with subpoena for financial info. Reasoning:

-It's confidential commercial info & disclosure would be harmful

-Info not relevant to case

-Much of league financial info already is public

The final date for the trial is reportedly scheduled for December 1, 2025. If the two teams lose the case, it could lead them to lose their charters, and with that, their guaranteed starting positions next season and beyond. Additionally, they will lose their share of revenue from NASCAR’s new broadcast deal.

NASCAR commissioner Steve Phelps is “not sure” why 23XI and FRM sued them

Steve Phelps, NASCAR’s newly named commissioner, appeared in an interview with CNBC Sports’ Brian Sullivan, where he spoke about the sport’s ongoing lawsuit with 23XI and Front Row Motorsports. Phelps didn’t find any antitrust angle to the issue and termed it a “contractual issue” instead.

“Listen, I’m not sure why [23XI Racing] decided to bring a suit, and there’s another team called [Front Row Motorsports] that also partnered with them on this suit,” Phelps told Sullivan. “It’s an antitrust case. We don’t believe it’s an antitrust case, we believe it’s a contractual issue.”

Phelps then mentioned that NASCAR even increased the teams’ cut (in revenue) significantly. So, the two teams prior allegation, which stated that NASCAR was monopolistic in business dealings, could not have been true.

“In my opinion, if you’re a monopolist, and you have that monopolist behavior, you’re not going to increase by 73%, you’re actually going to go backwards, because you have that ability to do it. For us, that’s not what we wanted to do, because we need healthy race teams,” Phelps added.

While the legal battle continues off track, all eyes are on the Grant Park 165 at the Chicago Street Circuit. Scheduled for 75 laps, this race will stream live on TNT Sports this coming Sunday, July 6, 2 pm ET onwards. MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will cover the event on the radio.