The Super Bowl has always been framed as America’s biggest sporting event, drawing more viewers than any other broadcast. But behind the million-dollar commercials, confetti, and championship rings lies a secret involving the game’s entanglement with human trafficking.
Last week, we discussed statistics involving sting operations in host cities ultimately leading to arrests and victim rescues. While researchers state that there are no statistics to prove that the Super Bowl was the largest trafficking event of the year, the numbers prove law enforcement takes that threat seriously, with a large number of crackdowns happening every year. Let us go deeper, not discuss just the crime itself, but the involvement of the NFL itself.
The NFL has taken steps to draw awareness to trafficking. In 2020, ESPN released a statement discussing the dramatic influx in trafficking during the Super Bowl. In 2014, the NFL started its campaign with “It’s a Penalty,” an organization known for educating and bringing awareness to trafficking. This partnership consisted of using star NFL players to create a public service announcement on how to educate fans to recognize and report signs of trafficking, with the campaign most visible leading up to the Super Bowl.
Posters and information kits are distributed in the host city at high-risk locations like hotels and airports. Homeland Security Investigations in partnership with the Department of Homeland Security’s Center for Countering Human Trafficking and the Blue Campaign hosted a human trafficking awareness workshop in September 2024 with over 200 people in attendance, including both state and local law enforcement, federal prosecutors, leaders from nongovernmental organizations, and personnel from the hospitality industry. With all this effort to combat trafficking, why does it still happen and at such high rates? Is it just a cover-up for their own involvement?
Conspiracy theorists also argue that powerful elites connected to the NFL, whether that be owners or celebrities, are somehow connected to trafficking networks. This theory gained significant momentum after the Jeffrey Epstein case. The case itself is grand enough to cover more of a Kaylee’s conspiracy wall than corner, but in summary, Epstein was a wealthy financier who was revealed to have “trafficked minors for sex” while maintaining ties to politicians, the wealthy, and celebrities.
The big claim is that Epstein was connected to Wall Street Investors, fashion icons, and even royalty, as well as sports billionaires. This could allegedly include NFL owners, sponsors, and popular athletes. With the Super Bowl drawing over 100 million viewers, flooding host cities with visitors, it would be easy for traffickers to hide in plain sight behind the size and wealth of the event.
NFL franchises are owned by some of the wealthiest of individuals in the country, considered by some to be in the “elite class.” They could use their status, wealth, and power to conceal any of their crimes, while making a profit.
According to the 2024 report by the International Labor Organization, the total profits from forced labor and forced sexual exploitation are estimated at $236 billion. Reread that number again. That is approximately anywhere from .25 percent to .30 percent of the global economy. ILO estimates that exploiters would make an average of $27,252 per victim, per year. And that is specifically in sex trafficking, not forced labor. No words can describe how absolutely sick and twisted that is. And while these numbers sound like they belong to some distant hell, the truth is even more chilling, reaching into the very institutions we glorify, including in some instances, the NFL.
Adarius Taylor, former NFL linebacker for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Cleveland Browns, and the Carolina Panthers was arrested in May of 2025 in Florida during a nine-day human trafficking sting “Operation Fool Around and Find Out.” He was arrested among 255 others, 141 being charged with “soliciting prostitutes” and 93 with “offering to commit prostitution,” among various other charges.
Taylor faced charges including “felony negligent child abuse” and “misdemeanor solicitation of prostitution” after allegedly leaving his six-year-old child unattended in his car while attempting to solicit an undercover officer posing as a sex worker. The child was immediately taken into custody by the Florida Department of Children and Families, who also participated in the sting operation.
In February of 2023, former NFL player Eric Johnson of the Atlanta Falcons was among eight alleged gang members accused of “violent gang activity targeting women, forcing them into sexual servitude for profit.” The Attorney General’s Office describes Johnson as one of the three leaders of the “Lotto” gang, accusing him of “trafficking women for sexual servitude, terrorism, kidnapping, aggravated assault, gang activity and racketeering.” Johnson and his gang have also been accused of “trafficking an underaged girl for sex.”
In 2019, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft was charged with “soliciting prostitution” rather than trafficking. This was all part of a sting operation that investigated “potential human sex trafficking” at massage parlors. While there was no evidence that Kraft was involved in trafficking, the investigation uncovered women that were “being trafficked and forced into sex work.” Ultimately, the charges against Kraft were dismissed after a court ruled that his privacy rights were violated by the “illegal use of surveillance videos.” Was this an accurate and proper interpretation of law, or did the wealthy and powerful use their status to escape these charges?
The NFL’s campaigns and partnerships toward human trafficking present themselves to be seen as part of the solution, but the arrests and allegations tied to its players and owners tell a more complicated story. On one side, you have posters, workshops, and campaigns urging fans to recognize and report trafficking. On the other, there are real cases where figures connected to the league have been allegedly implicated in the very crimes they condemn.
Whether this is coincidence, hypocrisy, or evidence to something much deeper and darker, a question still remains. As people point fingers at the wealthy and powerful, the entangled web of sports, money, and exploitation is starting to become impossible to just ignore. The Super Bowl may be a celebration of athletic achievement and greatness, but beneath the roaring crowds, screaming fans, confetti, and lights lurk a dark sea. One that demands far more scrutiny than simple awareness campaigns can provide.
What will it take for fans, lawmakers, and the league to demand real accountability? If the NFL really wants to be part of the solution, how much further must it go beyond awareness campaigns to confront the lies and crimes tied to its own ranks?