Senate Advances College Sports Bill and Judicial Nominee as House Remains Out

WASHINGTON — The House did not meet Tuesday and was scheduled to return Thursday, Sept. 24. The Senate, meanwhile, took steps toward later decisions on a college sports bill and a judicial nominee. Neither matter was finished before the Senate adjourned.

The Senate voted 70-21 to invoke cloture on a substitute amendment to S. 4668, the Protect College Sports Act. The bill would set federal requirements for name, image and likeness, or NIL, agreements involving college athletes, and provide a limited antitrust exemption for schools and conferences that pool certain college sports media rights.

Cloture is a Senate procedure that limits further debate. It does not pass a bill or confirm a nominee. The vote therefore moved the Senate toward further consideration of the college sports measure without resolving it. The Senate ordered postcloture consideration of the amendment to resume Wednesday.

The Senate also voted 52-43 to invoke cloture on the nomination of Angela Veronica Colmenero of Texas to be a U.S. district judge for the Southern District of Texas. That vote limited debate but was not a confirmation. The Senate scheduled executive-session action on her nomination for 2:15 p.m. Wednesday.

The day also produced completed Senate action. By unanimous consent, a procedure used when no senator objects, the chamber passed H.R. 952, concerning the federal government's reversionary interest in land in Sacramento, California, and H.R. 4467, concerning the boundary of Vicksburg National Military Park in Mississippi.

The Senate adopted resolutions recognizing Hispanic Heritage Month and supporting the goals and ideals of National Purple Heart Recognition Day. It also placed S. 5438, concerning the Coastal Plain oil and gas leasing program, and H.R. 9576, establishing a Justice Department fraud division, on the calendar. S. Con. Res. 40, a fiscal 2027 budget resolution, was discharged from the Budget Committee and placed on the calendar. Calendar placement makes a measure available for future Senate consideration; it does not enact it.

At adjournment, the college sports bill still required further legislative action, and Colmenero still had not received a confirmation vote. The Senate had arranged to return to both matters Wednesday, while the House remained out until its scheduled Thursday meeting.