Senate Clears Procedural Hurdle for National College Sports Rules

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted 70-21 Tuesday to end debate on a substitute amendment to the Protect College Sports Act of 2026, advancing the college-sports bill but not passing it. 1

The vote was on Amendment No. 6776, offered by Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., for Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas. It was a cloture vote — a Senate procedure that limits further debate. The vote did not approve the bill itself, S. 4668, and it did not adopt the other amendments senators had filed. 1

The bill would create national rules for college athletes’ name, image and likeness agreements, often called NIL deals. It would require agents to register with a state and limit their fees on endorsement contracts to 5%. It also would give athletes one transfer without losing athletic eligibility and limit compensation arrangements used to get around a cap on schools’ revenue sharing with athletes.

The measure would generally require large Division I schools — those with at least $80 million in annual athletics revenue — to preserve the number of scholarships and roster spots they offered in 2024-25 for sports that do not make a positive net revenue, including Olympic sports. It would allow certain financial-hardship waivers and end that requirement after nine years. It also would provide a limited antitrust exemption for qualifying agreements to pool and sell college-sports television rights, requiring participation by at least 75% of Football Bowl Subdivision schools. 1

Cruz said Congress needs to act because existing federal antitrust laws have not kept up with college athletics. “Our Nation’s antitrust laws were written over a century ago and were never designed to regulate NIL, transfer portals, billion-dollar media contracts, and the realities of modern college athletics,” he said. Cruz said the laws’ application had produced litigation and uncertainty, and he cited support for the bill from 32 conferences, more than 380 schools and the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. 2

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., described changes in the substitute. She said medical coverage and health and safety standards would be “a floor and not a ceiling,” allowing additional protections. Cantwell said the revision gives the NCAA more responsibility for school compliance, ties access to a retention fund to academic benchmarks and creates a commission to study whether student athletes should have a financial stake in their teams. She also said it would allow schools to seek streaming revenue for sports beyond football and basketball, help protect pending cases and narrow the bill’s eligibility-related preemption provisions. 3

The Congressional Record lists many proposed changes as submitted and ordered to lie on the table. That means they were filed, not adopted. They include proposals to cap coach salaries or buyouts, restrict private-equity participation, require disclosure of foreign financing, count certain NIL deals against revenue-sharing limits, preserve or expand legal claims, and alter antitrust provisions. 4

The Senate’s next steps are continued consideration of the substitute, possible action on amendments and a final-passage vote. The cloture vote alone did not make the proposal federal law.