During an emergency policy group meeting on Thursday for Hillsborough County, Florida, district commissioner Lesley Miller made it clear that Tampa officials will not make a decision to cancel the planned WrestleMania 36 event at Raymond James Stadium on April 5 at least for another week. Despite the state of Florida being in a state of emergency for public health and governor Ron DeSantis advising that all mass gatherings for the next 30 days be canceled or postponed, Miller said the decision would be left up to the WWE for the immediate future, though that could change in the coming days.
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“We know that right now WrestleMania is out about three weeks, and we came to the conclusion [that] right now we don’t want to pull that plug,” Miller said. “However, we wanted to give it at least a week to see what was going to happen, if the WWE was going to do anything at all. And if that don’t, at that point I would suggest we do bring this body back together in an emergency meeting to discuss what we do at that point in time.”
That meeting is confirmed for 1:30 p.m. ET on March 19.
WWE released a statement last week regarding the possibility of a cancellation.
“The health and safety of our fans, performers and employees are our top priorities and we are monitoring the situation closely with our partners and government officials in Tampa Bay,” WWE’s statement at the time read. “We remain committed to hosting WrestleMania at Raymond James Stadium on Sunday, April 5th, and like other entertainment properties in the U.S., there are currently no plans to cancel or postpone our upcoming events.”
On Wednesday night a report broke out that this week’s episode of Friday Night SmackDown (scheduled to take place in Detroit) had been canceled. WWE released a statement refuting that report, but did add that backup plans are being made in case government officials order an event be shut down.
“WWE has not cancelled Friday Night SmackDown in Detroit, however, based on the current situation, we are putting contingency plans in place in the event that upcoming WWE shows are cancelled by government officials, civil authorities and/or local venues,” the statement read.
If the show still goes on, here is the card:
- WWE Championship: Brock Lesnar vs. Drew McIntyre
- WWE Universal Championship: Goldberg vs. Roman Reigns
- John Cena vs. “The Fiend’ Bray Wyatt
- NXT Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley vs. Charlotte Flair
- Raw Women’s Champion Becky Lynch vs. Shayna Baszler
- AJ Styles vs. The Undertaker
