Statement of Subcommittee Ranking Member Jerry Nadler

House Judiciary Committee

Hearing on: Antitrust Law and the NCAA: Examining the Current Climate

March 11, 2025

Mr. Chairman, the business of college sports—a business that generates billions of dollars a year—has seen dramatic changes in recent years.  And the industry continues to evolve rapidly.  College athletes are being recognized and compensated for their talents and contributions as never before and new models of compensation continue to develop through litigation and other competitive pressures.

But now the NCAA, which generates nearly $1.3 billion a year in revenue, wants to stop this progress dead in its tracks.  It wants Congress to step in and protect the NCAA, its conferences, and schools from having to share a greater percentage of the money they rake in each year with their unpaid athletes, without whom there would be no revenue in the first place.

Unfortunately, instead of highlighting the need for continued reforms to the college athletic system to protect the rights of its athletes, today we are considering whether a repeat antitrust offender should get a bailout and be allowed to turn back many of these recent changes while diminishing the voice of college athletes in perpetuity.

The NCAA has lobbied Congress for years, seeking exemptions from our laws to preserve their monopoly on college sports.  For example, in the wake of Title IX’s passage—ushering in historic opportunities for women in sports—the then-all-male NCAA sought exemptions from the law.  In advance of litigation with the potential to disrupt their control over broadcast rights, the NCAA sought Congressional intervention.  When faced with lawsuits that could bring an end to their suppression of athletes’ ability to capitalize on their personal publicity rights—also called name, image, and likeness (NIL)—the NCAA asked Congress to step in.

And now, the NCAA is back, asking us once again to take action on their behalf, to turn back the clock on many recent changes to the collegiate system, and to render college athletes voiceless and powerless.

The only professional sport that enjoys the antitrust exemption the NCAA seeks is baseball.  And, for decades, this exemption suppressed professional baseball players’ abilities to unionize, make needed reforms to their sport, and obtain competitive salaries.

But now, many of the same Republican lawmakers who have decried Major League Baseball’s antitrust exemption want to grant the same safe harbor from our competition laws to the NCAA.

We have ample evidence that antitrust exemptions generally suppress wages, block access to necessary health and safety protections, and undermine competition.  There is no reason to contemplate a bailout for the NCAA, especially when it has demonstrated little regard for our competition laws, while failing to protect athletes from being exploited.

While paying coaches and executives exorbitant salaries from the hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue generated by college athletes, the NCAA insists it needs help from Congress to suppress players’ wages and rights to employment status.

While looking the other way on academic fraud, the NCAA insists that the current system is necessary to protect QUOTE “student-athletes”. The NCAA knows that athletes often miss class and cannot pursue their major of choice because of practice and travel schedules, yet they hold out the academic aspect of a college athlete’s experience as all-important.

While the NCAA insists it needs a bailout to ensure the survival of Olympic sports and to protect women athletes, it has failed to sufficiently promote those sports and has failed to ensure its member schools follow Title IX.

We should not reward the NCAA by placing restrictions on necessary changes to the collegiate athletic system—changes which are notably benefitting the athletes already and which the NCAA continues to resist and decry.

It is not just college athletes who are concerned about the special protections the NCAA is seeking.  The players associations of all the major professional sports have also weighed in.  In a joint statement, they wrote QUOTE: “NIL[name, image, and likeness] legislation purporting to protect athletes should not be used as a trojan horse to nullify athletes’ legal rights or status.

“Legislation that is meant to protect college athletes should under no circumstances eliminate or diminish their rights under contract, tort, antitrust, and/or labor laws...”  UNQUOTE

Similarly, in response to proposed legislation that would affirm that college athletes are employees under the National Labor Relations Act, the players associations wrote: QUOTE “Collective bargaining has immeasurably benefitted the workers we represent and professional sports as a whole.  Athletes enjoy elevated health and safety standards, medical benefits, fair compensation, and other rights both on and off the field.  Leagues and teams can negotiate roster construction, player reserve, and other competitive regulations.  And fans receive the most compelling entertainment product in the world.  The same result is achievable at the collegiate level…” UNQUOTE

Mr. Chairman, college sports have the power to bring communities together and to electrify the nation.  The college football playoffs brought heat to a cold winter and, this month, the country will be riveted by March Madness.

Perhaps the best way to fully appreciate college athletes is to watch them perform at the highest levels.

Please play the video clip.

[VIDEO CLIP PLAYS]

As you can see, NCAA college sports are compelling. They’re exciting, they’re electric, and people want to see them. Advertisers know this, and that is why the business of college sports is so lucrative.

But people are tuning in to see great athletes, and it is only fair that the athletes see a portion of the revenue generated by their performances.

College sports have also brought many non-financial benefits to its athletes—from life lessons about teamwork, building a strong work ethic, and gaining leadership skills, to promoting health and wellness.  And for some, it also has the potential to set them on the path to professional glory.

But for too many athletes, the current system has failed them.    Important changes are underway that have begun to level the playing field, and more are being considered.  We should not put our thumb on the scale in favor of an organization that, too often, has placed its profits over the interests of its athletes. 

I thank our witnesses for being here today and I look forward to their testimony.  I yield back.