According to Dave Meltzer, John Cena has informed the WWE brass that he will not take part of the Crown Jewel show in Saudi Arabia. Meltzer has also heard rumors that Daniel Bryan has also refused to take part in the event, though he claims that Cena's refusal is confirmed while Bryan's remains a rumor at this point.

This throws a big monkey wrench into the event as Cena is scheduled to take part of the "WWE World Cup" tournament, the matches of which will ultimately comprise most of the matches on the card. Cena's one of the biggest stars in the history of the company and he's someone that's ALWAYS done anything and everything the company has asked of him, so a refusal on his part is a pretty significant development in this whole shit sandwich that Vince is determined to eat no matter what. As for Daniel Bryan, he's scheduled to face AJ Styles at the event for the WWE Championship and even though it's a rumor, it's one I believe could easily be true; allegedly, Bryan's new WWE contract affords him as "reasonable degree" of creative control and it's something that's given him a good deal of leverage. Bryan is really only a pair of Jesus sandals away from being full blown king of the hippies in the first place, his politics are extremely left wing and it's easy to see how working Crown Jewel could make him feel quite uneasy.

Cena and Bryan are two of the small handful of men on the roster who could tell WWE no and not risk any real reprisal, but it also goes further than that. As I mentioned earlier, Cena has always gone above and beyond for WWE so if he's genuinely refusing to work Crown Jewel, then you have to figure that might give Vince some degree of pause.