A bipartisan Senate bill aimed at stabilizing college sports would impose strict limits on student-athletes' ability to transfer between schools while granting universities and the NCAA sweeping antitrust protections—raising concerns about whether the legislation prioritizes institutional interests over the rights of players who generate billions in revenue.
Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., the chair and ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, introduced the Protect College Sports Act after briefing The Associated Press on its contents. The legislation would restrict players to just one "free" transfer during their entire college careers and create new limits on coaching movement, including a "Lane Kiffin Rule" prohibiting midseason coaching changes.
Institutional Protections vs. Player Rights
The bill offers what Cruz described as "targeted antitrust protection" for organizations like the NCAA and the proposed College Sports Commission in exchange for what he called "public-facing protections" for athletes in 10 areas, including guarantees for health insurance and scholarships. However, the legislation would also preempt much of the patchwork of state laws currently regulating name, image and likeness payments—laws that have given athletes more leverage in negotiating compensation.
Meredith Page, the chair of the NCAA Division I Student Athlete Advocacy Committee and a former volleyball player at Radford, called the bill "a phenomenal step" that would "stabilize the field that is so, so unstable right now." The NCAA has actively supported key elements of the legislation, particularly the limited antitrust exemption.
Missouri attorney Mit Winter, who specializes in sports law, expressed skepticism about the bill's sweeping scope. "There almost wouldn't be any reason from the school side or NCAA side to collectively bargain if this entire bill is enacted into law because it provides everything they would want on their side from collective bargaining – limit on transfers, has the eligibility rules and it caps compensation for the athletes," he said.
Who Bears the Burden
The legislation comes as college sports grapples with rising costs of paying players and what officials describe as an "out-of-control transfer portal" that have threatened smaller sports, many involving women, that make up the backbone of the U.S. Olympic pipeline. Cantwell said she and Cruz worked together "because he and I really do believe the college sports system is in a bit of chaos."
"Why did we do it? Because when you've got thousands of athletes being cut, hundreds of programs being cut, the risk to the whole infrastructure was too high to not try to get better predictability," Cantwell said. Yet critics might note that the bill's approach to "predictability" involves restricting athlete mobility rather than addressing the underlying revenue distribution issues that have left many programs struggling.
The bill would adopt something close to the five-year eligibility period that the NCAA appears ready to enact next month and would impose more stringent regulations for NIL deals from third parties and agents who broker their deals.
Employment Status Remains Contested
Unlike the SCORE Act—which was abruptly pulled from the House schedule last week after the Congressional Black Caucus and NAACP came out against it—the new legislation takes what Cantwell described as a "neutral stance" on whether college athletes should be classified as employees of their schools. The SCORE Act's prohibition on employee classification was a major sticking point for many Democrats.
"Sen. Cruz and I have been very concerned about producing a bill that's not just about the 1% of athletes who go on and have a professional career," Cantwell said. "We took care of the entire ecosystem and have opportunities for athletes to continue to have that collegiate experience."
The bill also attempts to rework the Sports Broadcasting Act to allow conferences to pool their TV rights—a move proponents say could add billions of dollars to the ecosystem, though the Southeastern and Big Ten Conferences dispute this conclusion. Leagues wouldn't be required to join the media pooling, but those that do would have to use a percentage of any increase to support women's and Olympic sports. That provision alone could be a dealbreaker for the SEC.
The commissioners of the Atlantic Coast and Big 12 conferences said they were looking forward to reviewing the details, with the ACC's Jim Phillips saying he hoped the bill afforded his league a chance to "build upon today's positive momentum."
Coaching Restrictions
The legislation would prohibit midseason coaching changes, a response to incidents like Lane Kiffin's sudden move to LSU from rival Mississippi while the Rebels were preparing for the College Football Playoff last season. "It's not fair or right to poach a coach in the middle of the season while the team is still competing," Cruz said. "There's a reason the NFL has a rule that you can't do that."
Path Forward Uncertain
Cruz said the bill was crafted "in hopes it can get the 60 votes needed to clear the Senate." The SCORE Act had virtually no chance of passing as written in the Senate, where it would need 60 votes to break a possible filibuster, even if it had squeaked by in the razor-tight House.
"The Congressional Black Caucus and I have the same objective: stop the 'SEC SCORE Act,'" Cantwell said, referencing the SEC as one of dozens of conferences who have supported that bill.
Why This Matters:
This legislation represents a critical juncture in determining whether college athletes—who generate billions in revenue for universities and conferences—will gain meaningful labor protections or remain subject to institutional controls that limit their mobility and earning potential. The bill's approach of granting antitrust protections to governing bodies while restricting athletes to one transfer raises fundamental questions about power imbalances in college sports. As thousands of athletes face program cuts and hundreds of teams are eliminated, the debate centers on whether stability should be achieved through institutional consolidation or through stronger protections for the workers who make the system possible. The neutral stance on employment status leaves unresolved the core question of whether athletes deserve the same workplace rights as other students who work on campus, while the preemption of state NIL laws could eliminate one of the few avenues athletes have found to assert their economic interests in a system that has historically profited from their labor without adequate compensation.