WASHINGTON — Congress has re-upped its debate on college sports this month as lawmakers, President Donald Trump and athletic conference leaders take a second look at reforming the system.
After a vote on legislation to create a national framework for student-athlete compensation was canceled in the U.S. House last year, lawmakers have brought renewed attention to improving the landscape of college sports in 2026.
“We have an obligation to protect college sports,” Rep. Shomari Figures, D-Mobile, told Todd Stacy on Capitol Journal last week. “We know what college sports means to us here in the state of Alabama, especially as a state that doesn’t have professional athletics. We’re in the process of still trying to negotiate and hammer something out.”
The SCORE Act, a bipartisan bill cosponsored by Figures, would provide guidelines around name, image and likeness, or NIL, deals. But it faced opposition from most Democrats in the House over concerns it would not adequately protect student-athletes. A few Republicans were also opposed. The bill was also expected to face pushback in the Senate, where lawmakers have introduced their own college sports measures.
Recently, members of the Senate Health, Education, and Labor Committee, including Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., held a roundtable to discuss revenue sharing, collective bargaining, and classifying student-athletes as employees. Alabama’s senior senator wants to prioritize educational opportunities for college athletes, as less than half of 1% of them go pro, Tuberville said.
“We got to distinguish whether we’re an educational institution or minor sports,” Tuberville said during last week’s roundtable. “I did this for 35 years. I watched kids become successful that never would have had a chance if they didn’t go to college. (Now) they’re not graduating. Hell, they’re not even going to class. It’s a disaster.”
Tuberville also teased on social media that he was working on a new bill to reform college sports with an emphasis on the transfer portal. Currently, NCAA players are allowed to transfer an unlimited number of times.
“That’s what I wanna do,” Tuberville told Alabama Daily News. “Play five (years), one-time transfer, and if you transfer more than that, you gotta pay a one-year penalty. So we have to do the basic stuff before we can walk.”
During the roundtable, Tuberville emphasized his desire to limit student-athlete transfers to one time. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-CA, quickly replied, asking, “Same thing for the coaches?”
“You got me,” Tuberville quipped, who was the head football coach at four major universities. Tuberville later replied on social media that it was a different time when he was coaching, and NIL was not yet in existence for college sports.
Some Senate Democrats are focused on allowing student-athletes to unionize, so that they can advocate on behalf of themselves for fair compensation.
“I want athletes to be able to make what they deserve, just like I think an electrician or an actor or a painter should make what they deserve as well,” Murphy said.
“So that’s why I’ve suggested taking a look at collective bargaining, letting the athletes speak for themselves, saying that we shouldn’t micromanage as Congress the relationship between college athletes and colleges,” he added.
Tuberville told ADN he has no plans to address collective bargaining or unions as part of a future piece of legislation.
In 2023, Tuberville and former Sen. Joe Manchin, I-W.V., introduced legislation to establish national rules for NIL. It would also have required student-athletes to complete three years of eligibility before transferring schools. The bill, dubbed the PASS Act, never advanced out of committee.
Supporters of national NIL rules, including leaders of athletic associations and universities, argue that it will lead to uniformity. There is currently a patchwork of state laws governing the practice. Some states allow student-athletes to immediately start making money, while others face stricter regulations.
Earlier this month, Trump also brought the college sports crisis to the forefront. He held his own roundtable at the White House featuring several stakeholders, including former Alabama football coach Nick Saban. The participants again vented their frustrations with the current system during the discussion. The president teased an executive order on NIL, but no details were discussed.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., revealed at the roundtable that Republican leadership does have enough votes now to pass the SCORE Act.
“Next step is preparing that legislation for final passage,” Johnson said on March 6. “We think we’re very close.”
But even with the renewed attention, a solution to the patchwork of college sports rules still appears far away in Washington.
The Senate HELP Committee has also issued a request for information from stakeholders on how Congress can help fix college sports. Information will be accepted through April 10.