A bill to create nationwide rules for compensating college athletes and to limit athletic conference consolidation is on a glide path to passage in the Senate after it cleared a filibuster Thursday.
The measure guarantees athletes the right to cash in on their name, image and likeness — or NIL. It also sets rules on athletes’ ability to transfer schools and requires top-tier schools to maintain programs and scholarships for sports that do not draw as much attention, such as Olympic events.
The bill cleared on a 74-25 vote, far more than the 60 needed to advance, but it still needs to pass the House.
Supporters said the legislation is the only way to prevent an arms race among football programs, which could overwhelm colleges and drain money from their academics.
“If we’re going to have national competition, then it is only Congress that can establish a clear and enforceable legal rulebook. There’s no other option,” said Sen. Ted Cruz, Texas Republican and the chief author of the bill. “That is what the Protect College Sports Act does. And this is what student-athletes, coaches, universities and conferences have repeatedly come to Washington asking Congress to provide.”
Opponents of the bill have offered various complaints.
Some civil rights groups, including the NAACP, have argued that the bill leaves too much power in schools’ hands, allowing them to profit from athletes who will not receive fair compensation for their athletic prowess.
Other opponents called the bill an unwarranted intrusion into college sports.
“With gas at over $4 a gallon, a persistent war with Iran, $40 trillion in debt, the Senate has decided that the most urgent thing now is to dictate how college sports are run from Washington,” said Sen. Rand Paul, Kentucky Republican.
He acknowledged “chaos” in college sports but blamed antitrust laws that allowed the colleges to band together to set eligibility standards and federal courts for using cases to step in and set rules for eligibility and transfers.
The bill’s most prominent change would be increasing the amount of money schools are allowed to pay players. Each school’s rate is currently set at $21 million a year, under a court settlement. The bill would raise that cap to $48 million, with some of that money reserved for women’s and Olympic sports.
It would allow NIL deals, but channel them so they are not used to circumvent revenue-sharing caps.
Athletes would be allowed one transfer without penalty and would be given five years of eligibility to compete, starting either when they began college or when they turned 19.
The top four athletic conferences would be barred from further consolidation or from growing too large.
The legislation was negotiated by an army of lawyers and, after rewrites, has gained support from the National Collegiate Athletic Association, the big athletic conferences and some high-profile football and basketball coaches.
Mr. Cruz said the schools and conferences have struggled for years to fix things but have been unable to do so.
President Trump has been a major supporter of the bill, calling the current landscape “out of control.”
He warned that schools would cut revenue-losing sports such as women’s events, and predicted that some colleges would go bankrupt as they engaged in recruiting money battles.
Some schools have reported eyeing academic funds or charging students new “athletic fees” to keep up with the arms race.
Student-athletes had traditionally been constrained by NCAA rules, which barred them from profiting from their participation, except for scholarships and other school benefits.
In 2021, the NCAA reversed course and allowed students to negotiate deals for their name, image and likeness.
The NCAA then reached a court settlement that allowed schools to pay athletes directly through revenue sharing, supplanting the athletic booster “collectives” that had been paying.
Under that system, top college football players earn millions of dollars, though the majority of players collected less than $10,000 in 2025, according to Forbes.
Most of the opponents Thursday were Democrats who tended toward the party’s left wing.
Among the Republicans, Florida’s two senators, Rick Scott and Ashley Moody, joined Mr. Paul in opposition.
Sen. Bernard Sanders, Vermont independent, also voted no.
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