While college athletics leaders continue to hope for a federal solution to a wide range of issues, including NIL and player eligibility questions, they shouldn’t hold their breath that one is coming soon.
A trio of Senate Democrats — Sens. Maria Cantwell, Richard Blumenthal and Cory Booker — made very clear in a Zoom conference call Tuesday that they won’t support the SCORE Act and that it is unlikely to pass. “I can pretty well guarantee the SCORE Act ain’t going to make it through the United States Senate,” Blumenthal said.
“The SCORE Act is really … not what we think is for the athlete, let’s just put it that way,” Cantwell said. “It is not the solution for the athlete. You can say there’s a lot of people scoring. Two big divisions and their commissioners, they are scoring. The NCAA, they’re scoring. And now, apparently, private equity is scoring. Who is not scoring? The athletes.”
Blumenthal, the senior senator of Connecticut, said “nothing will pass if it is purely partisan” before the midterm elections in 2026. The NCAA and Power Four conferences have championed the SCORE Act (Student Compensation and Opportunity through Rights and Endorsements), and there was a time it had momentum, even making it out of its House of Representatives committee, but it has still yet to be introduced for a formal House vote. NCAA president Charlie Baker took an optimistic view earlier this week when he said the SCORE Act had “pretty good chance of making it through the House at some point.”
Even if it were to pass the House, it would need 60 votes to pass through the Senate. Republicans control both chambers but would need seven Democrat senators to vote for it, which has long been viewed as unlikely.
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