Dan Snyder

Early life

Snyder was born on November 23, 1964, in Silver Spring, Maryland. The son of Arlette (née Amsellem) and Gerald Snyder, he was raised in a Jewish household with his brother Zack Snyder. Gerald was a freelance writer who wrote for United Press International and National Geographic. At age 12, Snyder moved to Henley-on-Thames, a small town near London, where he attended private school. Snyder returned to the United States two years later and lived with his grandmother in Queens, New York. At age 15, his family moved to Rockville, Maryland, where Snyder graduated from Charles W. Woodward High School. Snyder's first job was at a B. Dalton bookstore in White Flint Mall. By age 20, he had dropped out of the University of Maryland, College Park and was running his own business, leasing jets to fly college students to spring break in Fort Lauderdale and the Caribbean. Snyder claimed to have earned US$1 million running the business with a friend out of his parents' apartment. Snyder courted real estate entrepreneur Mortimer Zuckerman, whose U.S. News & World Report was also interested in the college market and who agreed to finance his push to publish Campus USA, a magazine for college students. Zuckerman and Fred Drasner, co-publisher of Zuckerman's New York Daily News, invested $3 million in Campus USA. The venture closed after two years.

Sanctions & controversy

Snyder is widely considered to be one of the worst owners in the history of North American professional sports. Under his ownership, the team had a regular season record of 164–220–2 (.427) with a postseason record of 2–6 (.250), never reaching past the Divisional Round. The media alleged that his managerial style and workplace culture directly affected the team's performance during his tenure as the principal owner. In reflecting on Snyder in 2025, The Washington Post referred to him as "largely forgotten", while Snyder reportedly said that he "fucking hates it" when asked how he felt about seeing Washington win games without him in the 2024 NFL season, where they made their first NFC Championship Game appearance since the 1991 season, eight years before Snyder bought the team. Under Snyder, the team sued season ticket holders who were unable to pay during the Great Recession in the late 2000s, despite his claim that there were over 200,000 people on the season ticket waiting list. Partway through the 2009 season, Snyder temporarily banned all signs from FedExField, leading to further fan discontentment. Fans also expressed discontentment about the game day experience, rising ticket and parking prices, and Snyder's policy of charging fans for tailgates in special areas of the stadium lot. A 2023 survey conducted by the NFL Players Association ranked Washington as the worst team to play for, with the lowest grades for their team facilities and lack of accommodations for the players and their families.

Personal life

In 1994, Snyder married Tanya Ivey, a former fashion model from Atlanta. She is a national spokesperson for breast cancer awareness and was named co-CEO of the team in 2021. They have three children. In 2001, Snyder had surgery to remove a cancerous thyroid gland. In November 2022, he incorporated a private limited company in London that listed his residency in England. Snyder contributed $1 million to victims of the September 11 attacks and $600,000 to victims of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He paid shipping costs for charitable food shipments to those affected by the 2004 tsunami in Indonesia and Thailand. In 2016, following Hurricane Matthew, Snyder dispatched his private plane to provide emergency supplies in the Bahamas and medical supplies to Bernard Mevs Hospital in Port-au-Prince. In 2000, Snyder founded the Washington Redskins Charitable Foundation. He has been a long-time supporter of Youth For Tomorrow, an organization founded by former Redskins head coach and Pro Football Hall of Famer Joe Gibbs. In April 2010, the organization presented Snyder with its Distinguished Leader Award. In 2005, Snyder was inducted as a member of the Greater Washington Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. He owns a private plane, a Bombardier BD-700 Global Express XRS. In 2014, Snyder formed the Washington Redskins Original Americans Foundation to provide opportunities and resources to aid Tribal communities. The foundation was formed to address the challenges in the daily lives of Native Americans. Snyder has also supported Children's National Hospital, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), and other organizations. In May 2014, Snyder and Tanya received the Charles B. Wang International Children's Award from the NCMEC. He contributed $100,000 to Donald Trump's 2020 presidential campaign and $300,000 to humanitarian aid organizations for people affected by the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In March 2024, Snyder donated his 30,000 sq. ft. mansion in Potomac, Maryland, to the American Cancer Society (ACS) after being unable to find a buyer. The property, known as River House as it overlooks the Potomac River, was purchased from the estate of King Hussein and Queen Noor of Jordan in 2001 for $8.64 million. The ACS plans to sell the property and use the proceeds to support its mission of improving the lives of cancer patients and their families.

Career

With an investment from his father, Snyder and his sister Michele founded the marketing company Snyder Communications in 1988. They concentrated on wallboards in doctors' offices and colleges. They combined the advertisements with the distribution of product samples, such as soaps and packages of medicine, to differentiate themselves from their competitors. Snyder continued to expand its activities to different aspects of outsourced marketing. In 1992, the company expanded into telemarketing with a focus on the immigrant market. Revenues rose from $2.7 million in 1991 to $9 million in 1993. Snyder became the youngest CEO of a New York Stock Exchange listed company at the age of 32 when it underwent an initial public offering in September 1996. His top investors, including media mogul Barry Diller and Robert Strauss, earned significant returns on their initial investment. Mortimer Zuckerman and Fred Drasner, whom Snyder owed $3 million from the failure of his first business venture, were given company stock, which ended up being worth over $500 million. His parents sold their stock in the company for over $60 million. Snyder continued to expand the company through a string of acquisitions, such as Arnold Worldwide in 1997. By 1998, the company had over 12,000 employees and $1 billion in annual revenues. In April 2000, Snyder Communications was sold to the French advertising and marketing services group Havas in an all-stock transaction valued at in excess of $2 billion. Snyder's personal share of the proceeds was estimated to be $300 million.

In July 2020, The Washington Post published a series of articles alleging that over 40 women who were former employees of the organization, including office workers and cheerleaders, had been sexually harassed and discriminated against by Snyder and other male executives, colleagues, and players of the team since at least 2006. That December, it was also reported that Snyder had settled a sexual harassment claim with a former female employee for a sum of $1.6 million. The alleged incident had occurred on his private plane while returning from the Academy of Country Music Awards in 2009. Two private investigations at the time, hired by the team and an outside law firm, failed to substantiate the woman's claim, and it was reported that Snyder paid the sum to avoid any negative publicity. A year-long independent investigation into the team's workplace culture, led by lawyer Beth Wilkinson, was concluded in July 2021. It found that incidents of sexual harassment, bullying, and intimidation were commonplace throughout the organization under his ownership. The NFL fined the team $10 million in response, with Snyder also voluntarily stepping down from running the team's day-to-day operations for a few months, giving those responsibilities to his wife Tanya Snyder. On July 28, 2022, Snyder voluntarily testified before the congressional House Committee on Oversight and Reform regarding its investigation into Washingt