Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill once again finds himself as a defendant in a civil proceeding. Bidwill’s former personal assistant, Brittany Neuheisel, recently filed a lawsuit against Bidwill, as Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk relays.
Neuheisel, 54, who worked for Bidwill from January 2019 through January 2025, filed an 11-page complaint with causes of action like constructive discharge, wrongful discharge, discrimination based on age, gender, and religion, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. As context for those various counts, she makes a number of strange and/or disturbing allegations.
For instance, Neuheisel avers that, during a meeting between Bidwill and his niece regarding the niece’s college studies, Neuheisel was instructed to remove the niece’s personal belongings from the car Bidwill had given to the niece so he could repossess and sell the car. Neuheisel says she was further instructed to take a video of the car being loaded onto a flatbed, a video Bidwill wanted to play for his niece.
Bidwill also allegedly disparaged Neuheisel for Neuheisel’s relationship with her own family, and Neuheisel further claims Bidwill’s pit bull attacked her. That attack did not stop Bidwill from later asking Neuheisel to take the dog to the park while he interviewed Monti Ossenfort for the club’s GM position.
As Florio notes, perhaps the most concerning allegation – at least as far as Bidwill’s standing in the NFL is concerned – is Neuheisel’s assertion that Bidwill instructed her to falsify certain information required by federal and international disclosures pertaining to Bidwill’s travel by private plane. Neuheisel additionally claims her former employer directed her to ship a firearm via FedEx and to ignore any restrictions regarding such a shipment.
According to Neuheisel, Bidwill eventually decided to replace her with someone “young, beautiful, and athletic,” and when he made that decision, he began to verbally abuse her and take other action to force her resignation. When, citing her traditional Catholic background, she resisted his alleged instructions to have her falsify information, he allegedly told her to follow his instructions and simply go to confession afterwards. And when the Cardinals allowed the Rams to use their stadium for last month’s postseason contest against the Vikings due to the Los Angeles-area wildfires, Neuheisel says Bidwill “shunned” her when introducing league commissioner Roger Goodell to employees in Bidwill’s suite. Similarly, Bidwill allegedly berated Neuheisel after Rams owner Stan Kroenke did not visit the suite to personally thank the Cardinals owner for his hospitality.
Of course, this is not the first time a former employee has sued Bidwill. Less than one year ago, an arbitrator awarded former Cardinals exec Terry McDonough $3MM – the bulk of which was comprised of punitive damages – for “false and defamatory” statements that the team made about him to the media after McDonough’s original arbitration filing (which stemmed from allegations of using burner phones during then-GM Steve Keim‘s suspension and McDonough’s subsequent demotion and dismissal upon taking issue with the burner phone gambit).
Although the arbitrator dismissed McDonough’s claims regarding his actual firing, the win was notable because it came through the NFL’s in-house arbitration process, which is generally skewed in favor of league owners. McDonough, his wife, and his daughter subsequently filed a lawsuit against the team, Bidwill, and others, an action that is still pending.
As of yet, there have been no reports suggesting that Bidwill’s fellow owners will consider ousting Bidwill from their ranks or at least putting pressure on him to sell the team. Still, the allegations in McDonough’s and Neuheisel’s actions could, if substantiated, warm Bidwill’s seat.
In the wake of Neuheisel’s suit, the Cardinals released a statement adamantly denying the allegations contained therein (via Florio). The statement reads:
“Earlier this week, the Cardinals received an email from a California-based plaintiff’s lawyer. In it, he threatened to file a lawsuit unless the team agreed to his demand for a substantial amount of money by 5:00PM the next day. The team refused and the lawyer has now filed the Complaint. The Cardinals were surprised by and strongly deny the allegations made in this lawsuit and intend to defend the case on its merits in the appropriate forum. As this is now pending litigation, the team will refrain from further comment.”
