USWNT Soccer Lawsuit: Dismissal, $24M Settlement, and New CBAs

The USWNT equal pay lawsuit was a federal gender discrimination case filed in March 2019 by 28 U.S. women’s national team players against the U.S. Soccer Federation, alleging they were paid less than the men’s team for the same work. It ended in February 2022 with a $24 million settlement and new collective bargaining agreements that guarantee the men’s and women’s teams identical pay through 2028, including a pooled and equally split share of FIFA World Cup prize money.

What the Players Sued Over

The dispute began in March 2016, when five of the team’s most prominent players — Hope Solo, Carli Lloyd, Becky Sauerbrunn, Alex Morgan, and Megan Rapinoe — filed a wage discrimination complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. A 2017 collective bargaining agreement raised base pay by 30 percent and improved match bonuses, but the players considered the underlying inequity unresolved.¹

On March 8, 2019, International Women’s Day, the players withdrew the EEOC complaint and filed suit in the Central District of California. The complaint brought claims under the Equal Pay Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, alleging discrimination not only in compensation but also in travel, training conditions, medical treatment, coaching, and the frequency and location of matches.² The players sought roughly $67 million in back pay and damages.³

How U.S. Soccer Defended the Case

The federation’s core legal argument was structural. The women’s CBA prioritized guaranteed annual salaries, health benefits, and a larger number of contracted roster spots. The men operated on a pay-for-play model with no salary guarantees but higher per-game bonuses. U.S. Soccer contended the women had knowingly negotiated these terms and could not later recharacterize them as discriminatory.⁴

In March 2020, U.S. Soccer filed court documents arguing that the women’s team was physically and skillfully “inferior” to the men’s team. The claim drew immediate backlash from players, fans, and sponsors. Federation President Carlos Cordeiro apologized and resigned within days.³

Why the Pay Claim Was Dismissed in 2020

On May 1, 2020, U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner granted summary judgment for the federation on the pay claims. He found that the women had actually earned more than the men on both a cumulative and per-game basis during the relevant period. Because the players had rejected the men’s pay-for-play structure in their own CBA negotiations and chosen guaranteed compensation instead, Klausner ruled they could not now claim they were underpaid relative to what they would have earned under the men’s deal.⁴

The ruling turned on the distinction between total compensation and rate of pay. The women earned more overall because they played far more games, but they argued their per-game rate was lower. Klausner found the evidence on that point insufficient to create a genuine factual dispute.¹ Claims about unequal working conditions, including travel, hotel accommodations, and medical staffing, survived and were allowed to proceed toward trial.³

In late 2020, the two sides settled the working conditions claims, covering charter flights, hotel accommodations, venue selection, and professional support staff. That cleared the way for the players to appeal the pay ruling to the Ninth Circuit, which they did in April 2021.¹⁵ In early February 2022, the EEOC asked to participate in the appeal.³

How the $24 Million Settlement Was Structured

On February 22, 2022, before the Ninth Circuit heard oral argument, the players and U.S. Soccer announced a $24 million settlement. Of that total, $22 million went directly to the 28 plaintiffs as back pay, covering women who were members of the national team between June 2015 and November 2019. The remaining $2 million was placed into a fund for players’ post-career goals and charitable efforts related to women’s and girls’ soccer, with individual players eligible to apply for up to $50,000.⁶³

The settlement was contingent on ratification of new collective bargaining agreements that would lock in equal pay going forward. U.S. Soccer began making a series of $5.5 million payments starting June 1, 2022, and the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California granted preliminary approval of the deal on August 11, 2022.⁷

Megan Rapinoe, the team’s co-captain, called the settlement “a huge win in ensuring that we not only right the wrongs of the past, but set the next generation up for something we only dreamed of.” Alex Morgan, one of the original five EEOC complainants, said the goal had been to “equalize on all fronts.”⁸

What Equal Pay Looks Like Under the New CBAs

On May 18, 2022, U.S. Soccer and the men’s and women’s players’ associations announced new collective bargaining agreements running through 2028. The deals guarantee the two teams identical economic terms across every category of compensation and are described as the first of their kind in professional sports.⁹

The centerpiece is the pooling of FIFA World Cup prize money. Rather than each team keeping what FIFA allocates for its own tournament, the men’s and women’s prize earnings are combined and split equally, covering the 2022 and 2023 World Cups and the 2026 and 2027 cycles. U.S. Soccer is the only federation in the world that splits FIFA prize money equally between its men’s and women’s teams.¹⁰

Beyond World Cup payouts, the agreements set identical roster appearance fees and game bonuses tied to match outcomes and opponent ranking. U.S. Soccer’s broadcast, sponsorship, and partner revenue is divided 50/50 between the two teams. Players also receive a share of ticket revenue from home matches and a bonus for sellouts. In exchange, the women gave up guaranteed annual salaries, and U.S. Soccer stopped paying NWSL club salaries for national team players. Both teams now operate on the same pay-for-play model, with a 401(k) plan and a company match of up to five percent.⁹

What the Settlement Did Not Fix

The equal pay guarantee is domestic. Globally, the picture remains starkly unequal. The 2026 Men’s World Cup prize pool stands at $655 million, nearly six times the $110 million FIFA allocated for the 2023 Women’s World Cup. FIFA President Gianni Infantino has stated an “ambition” to reach prize money equality by the 2027 Women’s World Cup in Brazil, but has placed the onus on broadcasters and commercial partners, saying FIFA receives “between 10 and 100 times inferior offers for the Women’s World Cup.”¹⁰

FIFA has not announced the prize pool for the 2027 tournament, and there is no binding commitment to equalize it. FIFPRO, the world players’ union, has issued what it calls a “declaration of victory on equal pay by 2027,” but FIFA’s own statutes have prohibited gender-based discrimination since 2004 without being enforced on the prize money question. Legal scholars predict that if FIFA fails to equalize pay at the 2027 tournament, player-driven collective action, including formal legal challenges, will follow.¹¹

1
The New York Times. USWNT Soccer Equal Pay
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The New York Times. Womens Soccer Team Lawsuit Gender Discrimination
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The Washington Post. USWNT Pay Lawsuit Timeline
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NPR. Federal Judge Dismisses U.S. Womens Soccer Teams Equal Pay Claim
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Courthouse News Service. US Women Tell 9th Circuit Trial Court Didnt Factor Success
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CNBC. USWNT and US Soccer Federation Reach 24 Million Settlement in Equal Pay Lawsuit
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Fisher Phillips. US Womens Soccer Court Approval Historic Equal Pay Settlement Strengthen Pay Policies
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NBC News. US Soccer Women Soccer Stars Settle Equal Pay Lawsuit 24 Million
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U.S. Soccer. USSF Womens and Mens National Team Unions Agree to Historic Collective Bargaining Agreements
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USA Today. FIFA 2026 World Cup Prize Money Record USWNT
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Springer. FIFA Equal Prize Money Analysis