Robin DeLorenzo, one of the first women referees in the NFL, has filed a discrimination lawsuit against league, claiming she faced sexism while serving.
DeLorenzo filed her suit in Manhattan federal court last week, claiming she faced “gender-based scrutiny, humiliation, and hostility” while officiating between 2022 and 2025. She was one of three women to enter the NFL officiating crew at the time.
“[DeLorenzo] worked her way through two decades of officiating — breaking barriers, making history, and outperforming expectations at every level — only to be met with hostility, retaliation, and systemic inequality the moment she stepped into a league that claims to champion opportunities for women,” the lawsuit said.
“Instead of supporting one of the only women on its officiating staff, the NFL exposed her to unchecked harassment, denied her the resources given to men, manipulated her training and grading opportunities, and ultimately ended her career based on tainted evaluations created by the very people who discriminated against her,” it added.
According to the New York Post, the lawsuit also “depicts a pattern of discriminatory indignities, which began when DeLorenzo, 59, was provided with ill-fitting, man-sized clothing and instructed to showcase her ponytail through her hat, seemingly to emphasize that a woman was on the field.”
The legal filing also claimed that one day during training camp, an NFL officials crew chief told former Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin to have DeLorenzo “put on an utterly humiliating singing performance,” as if she were an NFL rookie — an incident the suit says compounded her ongoing emotional distress during her tenure.
Not long after, the suit asserts, DeLorenzo was repeatedly exposed to harassment and derogatory remarks from her crew chief, who had already been accused of mistreating another female employee. By the end of the season, the crew chief refused to speak to her.
DeLorenzo also claims in the suit that she was subjected to a “male power play” when she was forced to attend “an alleged training opportunity” that no male official had to attend.
“It was a male power play that served its purpose of humiliating the plaintiff, shattering her confidence, and significantly hindering her NFL career,” the suit declared.