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A federal judge in Florida has ordered former AEW commentator Kevin Kelly (real name Kevin Foote), and former AEW wrestlers Brandon Tate and Brent Tate to resolve their claims against All Elite Wrestling through arbitration, a private dispute resolution process away from public court.

The decision from Judge Harvey E. Schlesinger is a significant win for AEW, which asked the court to uphold the arbitration clauses in the plaintiffs’ talent contracts.

The order issued on Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida granted AEW’s motion to compel arbitration but denied the wrestling company’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit, as courts sometimes do when disputes are ordered to go to arbitration. Instead of dismissing the case, the judge ordered that the lawsuit be “administratively closed,” essentially making the case inactive while arbitration proceeds. The plaintiffs will be required to update the court on the status of arbitration every 90 days going forward. Those updates may appear on the public docket, but may not provide much insight into what exactly is happening between the parties in arbitration.

When reached for comment by POST Wrestling, attorney for Kelly and the Tates, Stephen P. New, stated: “We look forward to pursuing the plaintiffs’ claims in arbitration.”

A request for comment to AEW wasn’t immediately returned.

Kelly and the Tate brothers sued AEW, as well as AEW President Tony Khan and commentator Ian Riccaboni, first filing their complaint in August 2024 in the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia County. The plaintiffs alleged breach of contract, defamation, and other claims after they were separated from AEW in 2024. The case was later moved to federal court in Pennsylvania before relocating to the Florida federal court at AEW’s urging.

In April, Khan’s wrestling company reached an agreement to move a separate dispute with former AEW wrestler Ryan Nemeth into private arbitration.

Critics of arbitration contend that the process favors more powerful defendants, such as employers like AEW, citing the secretive nature of the litigation, limited discovery, and the tendency of large businesses to develop favorable relationships with the arbitration firms they use, among other criticisms.

Nonetheless, arbitration clauses that keep legal matters out of public view are believed to be widely included in contracts that wrestlers and other on-air talent agree to with major wrestling companies.

In his ruling, Schlesinger quoted the arbitration language from the plaintiffs’ talent contracts, describing it as a “classic” delegation provision that requires disputes to be resolved outside of the public court system.

[A]ll disputes between Talent and AEW, including, without limitation, any dispute relating to any matter arising under this Agreement or any dispute concerning the performance, application or interpretation of any provision of this Agreement (including, without limitation, the application of this Section 16 to any dispute), shall be resolved for final, binding, and conclusive arbitration conducted before a single arbitrator in Duval County, Florida and administered by JAMS, Inc. pursuant to its Comprehensive Arbitration Rules and Procedures.

Schlesinger noted that this type of clause gives the arbitrator, not the judge, the authority to decide key preliminary questions, such as whether the claims in the lawsuit are even eligible for arbitration in the first place.

The judge found that the plaintiffs hadn’t sufficiently challenged the issue of whether the dispute had been delegated to arbitration. He noted that Kelly and the Tate Twins claimed that the arbitration clauses, as well as the entire contracts, were unconscionable and unenforceable, including the delegation clause. However, Schlesinger characterized those arguments as “generalized” and insufficient to constitute the kind of specific challenge to the delegation clause that is required.

Citing a ruling in an authoritative appeals court ruling, the judge relayed that “[t]o directly or specifically challenge the validity or enforceability of a delegation agreement, it is not sufficient for a party to merely say the words, ‘I am challenging the delegation agreement'”.

The plaintiffs “do not offer any details about why the delegation provision specifically, apart from the Agreement as a whole, is unconscionable and thus unenforceable,” Schlesinger added.

“Reading Plaintiffs’ Response in the most gracious light possible,” the judge concluded, “this Court finds that Plaintiffs have not specifically challenged the delegation clause.”

While the order ends the court proceedings for now, the plaintiffs may still pursue their claims in the arbitration forum designated by their agreements.

Kelly’s claims included allegations that Riccaboni wrongly framed him as a member of QAnon after Kelly made a social media post in support of the film The Sound of Freedom, which Kelly contends led to his termination from AEW.

The Tate Twins allege that Khan made damaging remarks at a press conference about their reliability, after the brothers were among talent cut from the roster in April 2024.