No Tour, LIV or PIF officials at Wed. Senate hearing

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) will continue his examination of Saudi Arabia’s move into professional golf and other U.S.-based investments through its Public Investment Fund, in a hearing scheduled for Wednesday in Washington D.C.

The hearing, dubbed the “PGA Tour-LIV Deal: Examining the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund’s Investments in the United States,” follows a similar hearing in July when Tour officials were questioned about the circuit’s framework agreement with the PIF.

Wednesday’s hearing will feature testimony from Benjamin Freeman, the director of the Democratizing Foreign Policy Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft; Brian Murphy, the managing director of Logically AI Inc.; and Joey Shea with Human Rights Watch.

No officials from the Tour, the PIF or LIV Golf are scheduled to testify at the hearing.

PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan and LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman were requested to testify at the hearing in July but cited scheduling conflicts and didn’t attend. Last month, Blumenthal sent another request to the PIF for Al-Rumayyan to testify before the permanent subcommittee on investigations.

According to Blumenthal’s office, the PIF’s U.S. public holdings have increased from approximately $2.5 billion in 2018 to over $35 billion, including at least $2 billion invested in LIV Golf, according to court filings.