SCORE Act receives support from over 20 conservative groups as NIL reform fight revs up

1 week ago 12

NEWYou tin present perceive to Fox News articles!

More than 20 blimpish organizations expressed enactment for the Student Compensation and Opportunity done Rights and Endorsements (SCORE) Act, according to a missive addressed to House Speaker Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., obtained by Fox News Digital.

The SCORE Act would springiness the NCAA a constricted antitrust exemption successful hopes of protecting the NCAA from imaginable lawsuits implicit eligibility rules and would prohibit athletes from becoming employees of their schools.

"The SCORE Act is the escaped market, idiosyncratic liberty, constricted authorities hole to the "name, image, and likeness (NIL)" contented successful assemblage athletics," the missive read.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM

Patrick Ngongba shoots successful the paint

Duke halfway Patrick Ngongba (21) shoots against Arkansas guardant Malique Ewin (12) during the archetypal fractional of an NCAA assemblage hoops crippled successful the CBS Sports Thanksgiving Classic tourney Thursday, Nov. 27, 2025, successful Chicago. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)

"In 2021, the NCAA v. Alston lawsuit earlier the Supreme Court resulted successful schools gaining state to connection further education-related benefits to students, which acceptable the signifier for an enlargement of NIL rights. In the years since, a patchwork of confusing authorities laws person been enacted, which outcry retired for a national solution to make unified NIL rules that are accordant for everyone."

The groups successful favour of the SCORE Act said the measure is the "common-sense way" to found rules and preempt confusing authorities laws successful the NIL era.

"H.R. 4312 prohibits proceedings lawyers from suing nether national oregon authorities antitrust law. It besides provides that athletes receiving NIL compensation request not beryllium employees of these universities, protecting them from compulsory unionization. This means student-athletes tin beryllium treated arsenic tiny concern owners, not unionized workers," the missive added.

The blimpish groups framed the SCORE Act arsenic being a amended program than the "Student Athlete Fairness and Enforcement (SAFE) Act," which has mostly been backed by Democrats. The SCORE Act has astatine slightest scored immoderate bipartisanship enactment successful the House.

The SAFE Act proposes to rewrite the 1961 Sports Broadcasting Act to let conferences to excavation media rights. Supporters accidental it could inject billions into assemblage sports.

North Carolina State's Caden Fordham (1) celebrates aft a sack of North Carolina backmost Gio Lopez (not shown) during the archetypal fractional of an NCAA assemblage shot crippled successful Raleigh, North Carolina, Saturday, Nov. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Karl DeBlaker)

SEN JOHN THUNE OFFERS POTENTIAL SOLUTION FOR NIL REFORM: 'LIKE THE NFL WITHOUT A CONTRACT'

"The Left’s projected model to modulate NIL would beryllium a disaster. Known arsenic the "SAFE Act," it would unfastened the doorway for proceedings lawyers to frivolously writer diversion departments and conferences," the blimpish groups said. "It could besides necessitate student-athletes to beryllium classified arsenic employees, forcing galore of them into unions, utilizing simply the predicate of NIL compensation.

"Bizarrely, the SAFE Act would besides make a socialized assemblage sports media contract, imposing a nationalist authorities committee to negociate for each colleges. Washington bureaucrats should not beryllium successful the concern of negotiating sports tv and streaming rights."

Leaders from the Center for a Free Economy, 60 Plus Association, Constitutional Rights PAC, Parkview Institute, DL Maradona Foundation, US Policy, Southeast Texans for Liberty, National Taxpayers Union, Family Business Coalition, Frontiers of Freedom, Tradition, Family, Property, Founding Principles Coalition, America First PACT, American Commitment, Competitive Enterprise Institute, Southwest Public Policy Center, Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council, Hispanic Leadership Fund, Inventor’s Project, Gator PAC and Committee to Unleash Prosperity.

"Thirty-one Division I diversion conferences with wide-ranging membership, from schools with tiny budgets to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), person publically endorsed the SCORE Act arsenic the solution to protecting opportunities for student-athletes. The way guardant is clear. We impulse you to enactment the SCORE Act and reason the Big Government SAFE Act," the missive read.

The SCORE Act calls connected schools to stock revenue, per presumption of the House colony to the tune of 22% "if specified rules supply that specified excavation bounds is AT LEAST 22 percent of the mean yearly assemblage sports gross of the 70 highest-earning schools."