How about that: Congress may still be capable of effective bipartisan work after all, if the Protect College Sports Act is any indication.
A 2021 US Supreme Court ruling transformed the collegiate sports landscape by voiding the NCAA’s limits on amateur compensation as an antitrust violation; then the 2025 settlement in House v. NCAA introduced a revenue-sharing system that lets schools pay student-athletes directly.
Hats off to Sens. Ted Crux (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) for negotiating a rational effort to calm the chaos now plaguing college athletics.
Of course, college football and basketball started turning into serious business decades ago, but increasing commercialization paired with schools’ nonprofit status and the shady “booster” world has opened the door to “outlaw” behavior by coaches, programs and whole conferences that’s made a mockery of any “amateur” anything here — and also undermined less-commercial student-athletics.
This mess has been begging for federal oversight to impose some regulatory guardrails, and President Donald Trump’s executive order and other interventions this year could only do so much.
Congress had been mired in competing Democratic and Republican bills, but Cruz and Cantwell hope to break the deadlock.
Trump’s April executive order set an Aug. 1 deadline for new national rules and threatened to withhold federal funding for colleges and universities that fail to comply; that seems to have inspired all the interests to work with the senators on a formula that can restore sanity while protecting students’ rights.
Cruz-Cantwell would mandate a five-year cap on eligibility, limit the “transfer portal” to keep players from repeatedly switching schools, regulate boosters and agents and protect women’s and Olympic college sports — while granting the NCAA and conferences some antitrust protections, creating one national Name, Image and Likeness law governing monetization of college athlete’s individual brands and guaranteeing health coverage for student players.
No, it’s not perfect; it’s a compromise.
But a reasonable compromise on a genuine problem; the Senate and House should get it passed in time to meet Trump’s deadline.
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