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Saudi Arabia s sovereign wealth fund says a decision by its chief to provide information in an antitrust fight between LIV Golf and PGA Tour Inc. is an extraordinary infringement on the kingdom's sovereignty.
The Public Investment Fund, which bankrolls the upstart LIV, asked a federal judge late Tuesday to reverse a federal magistrate s order granting PGA s request to force LIV s backer and its governor, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, to testify under oath and produce documents.
PIF and Al-Rumayyan are a sovereign instrumentality of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and a sitting minister of the Saudi government, and they can not be compelled to provide testimony and documents in a US proceeding unless their conduct is truly the gravamen of the case, their lawyers said in a filing.
On Wednesday, US District Judge Beth Labson Freeman, who is overseeing the dispute, allowed lawyers representing Saudi Arabia to file a friend-of-the-court brief backing PIF and Al-Rumayyan's objections to the subpoena ruling. A subpoena from a private party, the PGA, against a foreign sovereign and its senior official acting in a government capacity is unprecedented, the kingdom s lawyers said in their brief.
A PGA spokeswoman wouldn't say anything about the filing.
Such conduct amounts to commercial activities that are not covered by US law, Van Keulen ruled. The Saudi fund's lawyers argued that sovereign immunity shields the fund and Al-Rumayyan from providing evidence in US courts.
The fund's attorneys said in Tuesday s filing that Van Keulen created a genuinely unprecedented commercial activity exception to the common law immunity applicable to foreign governmental officials. They said the fund and its chief would violate Saudi law that safeguards the confidentiality of certain government documents and impose fines on those who furnish classified records.
PIF also asked Freeman to halt the gathering of all evidence until she rules on its challenge to Van Keulen's order.
The PGA wants to gather more material to support its claims that LIV unlawfully pushed players to break contracts with the US-based tour by offering them exorbitant sums of money.
The fight between the two tours began when 11 professional golfers, including Matt Jones, Talor Gooch and Phil Mickelson, sued the PGA in August for suspending them after they signed on with LIV. LIV joined the suit a month later, prompting Mickelson, Gooch and others to withdraw from it. LIV claims that the PGA is a monopolist who is trying to sabotage a competitor in the professional golf industry.
PGA countersuas, alleging that LIV is unfairly competing by luring players with millions of dollars to breach their contracts.
The case is Jones v. PGA Tour Inc. 22 cv-04486, US District Court, Northern District of California San Jose