Shams Charania is standing by his reporting, even as an attorney for Lakers heir Jeanie Buss accuse him of “falsely” reporting that all six Buss siblings voted to sell the family’s remaining 17.8% stake in the franchise amid a sale from current majority owner Mark Walter to a group led by Josh Kushner and Bob Iger.
On Monday, Charania reported that the Buss family voted to sell its remaining 17.8% stake in the Lakers, meaning that Jeanie Buss’ tenure as the franchise’s governor would come to an end. (The NBA requires team governors to hold at minimum a 15% ownership stake.)
Buss, however, does not view the vote as legitimate. Through her lawyer, she said any vote by the family is void because it conflicts with the Buss family trust that ensures Jeanie Buss remains the controlling owner of the Lakers.
Many interpreted Charania’s initial report to suggest that all six Buss siblings voted in favor of the sale. In reality, five Buss siblings, sans Jeanie, voted to sell, while Jeanie appeared to abstain. Charania and ESPN subsequently updated the report to clarify Jeanie Buss did not vote with her other siblings, but did not issue a formal correction.
Buss’ lawyer took aim at Charania in a statement on Monday:
“As you know, this afternoon, Shams Charania of ESPN falsely reported that the six Buss siblings voted to sell the 17.8% ownership stake in the Lakers to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger, and that my client, Jeanie Buss, is ‘out’ as controlling owner,” the statement read. “This is just the latest instance of a years-long pattern whereby Joey and Jesse Buss leak false, defamatory and pernicious ‘information’ to Mr. Charania for the malicious purpose of doing harm to the Los Angeles Lakers so long as Dr. Buss’s chosen successor, Jeanie Buss, carries out her father’s wishes.”
Appearing on The Pat McAfee Show on Tuesday, Charania explained that the claim made by Buss’ lawyers are inaccurate.
“The first line of the statement from the lawyers said that I ‘reported that the six Buss siblings voted to sell.’ That key sentence right there is inaccurate,” Charania said. “So I fully stand by my reporting. I’ve handled every story with care, including stories with the Lakers, as that statement continues on. …Only the siblings, the lawyers involved, have access to what the trust actually says. The five siblings believe they have the majority votes, that they have the 5-to-1 majority votes to go along with the tag-along provision.
“And just think about it. A year ago, Jeanie Buss pushed the sale for $10 billion to Mark Walter. And now, a year later, Mark Walter, who is under two federal investigations, has sold, within a multi-day span, to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger at $12.5 billion. So the family trust believes it’s now time to cleanly exit, and in their words ‘gracefully exit,’ but this is now setting up to be a potential legal battle in the courts between one sibling, the controlling governor as of right now, and her five siblings.”
It appears as if there is some disagreement over how Charania characterized the vote in his initial report. Per Charania, just four siblings needed to vote in favor for the sale of the 17.8% stake to move forward. However, based on her lawyer’s letter, Buss believes she has total veto power to negate such a vote. If that’s her belief, Buss would logically take issue with Charania’s framing that she would no longer continue as Lakers governor. Additionally, there could have been some confusion over how Charania phrased the initial report if the vote was technically unanimous, with five voting in favor and none against, and Jeanie Buss choosing to abstain out of principle. And according to Charania, he never suggested “the six Buss siblings voted to sell.”
Whatever the circumstances, ESPN deemed any clarifications made to the initial report minor enough not to warrant a full correction.
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