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I love government. Shady deals, back-room meetings; it's grifter paradise.

Sophie


The team must go up against Congress to stop a competitive cheerleading company that puts its students at risk.

The Client[]

An injured cheerleader named Marcie and her coach, Heather Cornell, who want cheerleading to be made safer for the cheerleaders.

The Mark[]

PEP Athletics and their CEO Wendy Barron, who control competitive cheerleading and write the safety standards to be inexpensive, but do not protect the participants.

Locations[]

The action takes place in Washington DC, in Congress and at PEP's cheerleading camp prior to a competition.

The Con[]

The main con is to get Congress to pass a law making cheerleading a sport, not an activity, since as a sport, proper safety standards can be imposed.

Episode Notes[]

  • This is one of the first episodes to show Parker caring about other people.

Guest Cast[]

Trivia[]

  • The legality alerts that Hardison puts on Pep companies are actually just strings of random words.
  • The first place Hardison finds money for the bill is the XJ-12 project, which was first mentioned in The Three Days of the Hunter Job.
  • This episode is based on the real-life company Varsity Brands, who control the vast majority of the competitive cheer industry. In May 2020, an anti-trust lawsuit was filed against the company.
  • This episode is somewhat confusing, but one line around 30 minutes in makes it clear. The team wants the bill to pass. The mark wants the bill to fail. She wants to buy the company and take it private. If the bill fails, the company's stock prices rise dramatically, and she will not be able to afford to buy it, so she wants the bill to fail after she has gotten together the money to buy it. She is upset with the Leverage team for trying to pass the bill, and for moving the date of it up. Failing the bill would increase stock prices because it will make sure that oversight on the company remains low, and so profits remain high.

Episode Media[]

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