Business Meeting on Student Athlete NIL Rights and Coast Guard Promotion List

Good morning. The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation will come to order. For years, athletes, fans and universities have watched the foundation of college sports crumble. Court decisions, settlements, state laws, conference realignment, transfer disputes, NIL collectives, and uneven enforcement have all pushed college sports into a system where the rules are uncertain, the incentives are distorted, and the people with the least power are too often left exposed. The Protect College Sports Act is a landmark bipartisan bill that will preserve and strengthen our uniquely American system of college athletics. I want to thank ranking member Cantwell, Senator Eric Schmidt, Senator Chris Coons, all of whom have spent months and years working to craft this legislation and to build the bipartisan coalition behind it. I also also want to thank members of this committee on both sides of the aisle who have contributed constructively to the process. including Senator Fischer, for her work on the Super League Prohibition. Similar concerns and amendments were raised by Senators Baldwin, and and we've listened and and worked hard to address them. I also want to thank Senators Budd, Capito, Hickenlooper and Rosen, whose work has helped improve the bill before us today. No one got everything they wanted, but we did create a framework that stabilizes college athletics in the NIL and revenue sharing era. The substitute we are considering reflects that work. It strengthens the bill, responds to concerns raised by members and stakeholders, and it preserves the bipartisan agreement that brought us here. The new version includes a more balanced approach to the Super League issue. Rather than targeting any one conference or treating the SEC or and Big Ten differently from everyone else, It focuses on broader principles we're trying to protect. Fair competition, broad opportunity, and a college sports system that remains open to more than a handful of the wealthiest programs. The new agreement also reflects the the critical importance of Olympic sports. That is a major part of what this bill is about. College athletics is not only football and men's basketball. It is also swimming and wrestling and rowing, gymnastics, track and field, softball, and many other sports that create educational opportunities and help develop America's future Olympians and future leaders. That's because the greatest risk facing college athletics today is not any single controversy, court decision, or headline. The greatest threat to college sports is inaction. The laws enacted by past congresses are the reason why the current system is growing more unstable. If Congress doesn't fix these laws and pass this bill, the cost of our failure will be measured not only in dollars or wins and losses, the cost of our failure will be measured in lost opportunities, opportunities to earn a scholarship, to compete, to earn a college degree. Doing nothing means hundreds of thousands of students that right now have the chance to go to college, see that opportunity go away. I know that some say that because c- college athletics is so popular, Congress should not get involved. But high television ratings or rabid fan bases do not prove that the system is healthy. It just proves that the product is worth saving. Millions of Americans care deeply about college sports. They care about the athletes and the schools. They care about the rivalries and the traditions. that connect families and towns and campuses and states. That is precisely why Congress cannot simply hope that the system will correct itself. Any serious solution must begin with reality. The NIL era is here, it is reality. The Protect College Sports Act embraces this new environment while establishing the rules necessary to bring order to the chaos. Student athletes should be able to earn money from their name, image and likeness. This bill protects that. But a system that protects athletes also needs rules. Real NIL is not the same thing as a disguised recruiting payment as a booster in a back alley with a bag of cash. Revenue sharing is not the same thing as unlimited cap evasion. Athlete mobility is not the same thing as permanent roster free agency. And legal certainty does not mean a blank blank check. The Protect College Sports Act draws these lines. It protects legitimate NIL activity while distinguishing real endorsement deals from payments used to buy rosters. It protects scholarships. It strengthens medical coverage for athletes. It restores structure to transfers and eligibility. And it protects athletes from inducements and tampering. Athletes get real NIL certainty. medical protections, academic and scholarship protections. Schools get enforceable rules and stability. Fans get stronger protections for rivalries, access to game and fair competition. Let me give an analogy about where we are today. On the football field, punting on the fourth down can often be the prudent choice. But there are moments in a game when the stakes, the field position, the time left on the clock demands that you go for it. We have studied the challenges and seen the consequences of standing still. The future of college athletics is now in Congress's hands. We can sit in the stands and watch the system continue to unravel, or we can step onto the field and lead. I believe this moment calls for leadership. No more punting. We're in fourth down territory. It's time to go for it. I would note that there are a total of twenty-four conferences across the country that are in enthusiastically supporting this bill. The NFL is supporting this bill. The NBA is supporting this bill. Major League Baseball is supporting this bill. The NBA Players Association is supporting this bill. The NFL Players Association is supporting this bill. College coaches, we have over a hundred coaches, many of the most prominent coaches in the country enthusiastically supporting this bill. I strongly urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to to support the Protect College Sports Act. And I will note, we have received thirty-eight additional letters of support since our hearing two weeks ago. We now have vocal public support from twenty-three conferences, representing two hundred and forty-nine schools in forty-nine states. With that, I'll recognize Ranking Member Cantwell.

Thank you, Mister Chairman, and thank you for this bipartisan accomplishment. A lot of people in Washington my Washington and around the country think that bipartisanship is dead. But on behalf of five hundred thousand athletes who are seeing their future opportunities dimmed, we decided to work together to try to address this problem. I wanna thank our colleague, Senator Coons, who's in the back of the audience here for his participation in helping us get this over the goal line. And before I go on, I wanna thank our staffs for both the majority and the minority committee, including Shannen Smith, who had to retire a week ago. But this staff has worked on this issue tirelessly for a long period of time, and we just could not be here today without them. As you said, this is landmark legislation. It is landmark legislation because it is the first time we will be creating a federal right for student athletes in name, image and likeness that does preempt state laws that are much weaker and basically negate many of the opportunities of athletes if you are in conflict with your university. This bill stands tall on behalf of athletes. It's landmark legislation because it codifies ten years of scholarship opportunities for athletes so that you can complete your college education. We're not saying it takes you ten years, we're simply saying that you have your five years of scholarship, and if somehow you do go make it to a pro league and wanna come back, we also give you additional time to complete that all college education. Ten years of making sure that your health and your health care is covered. And I think that this is landmark because not only are you covering the time that you're playing at as an athlete, but in case that you're injured, we are also helping you after you graduate from college to take care of any of those issues. I wanna thank the chairman again for including a major piece of the legislation, historic, historic legislation in a medical trust fund to help institutions like HBCU's who can't afford to meet those obligations or the obligations of CTE to include that as a first time part of federal legislation, historic. I wanna thank the McNair family who first brought these issues to us when their son died playing football in Maryland in the heat of the day and basically did not receive enough proper training. He educated us on the standards that needed to be in our legislation on health and safety, And this is the most landmark piece of legislation protecting student-athletes for the type of preparation they need to compete in college sports. I want to thank the chairman for including an improvement to that medical trust fund offered by Senator Kim to make sure that that money is enhanced in the future if somehow it's not uh meeting the needs of what is required. The legislation is also landmark in that it definitely makes sure that predatory contracting, done by agents, or universities, or conferences, or shill organizations, don't get students stuck in binding arbitration. No way out because you signed a document that basically you didn't even understand, and basically took away your legal rights. This is landmark. in the protections that it gives student athletes. It is also landmark in cutting down on agents' activities because we've seen the worst of activities taking advantage of high school students, asking them to sign somebody comes up to you in a high school gym after you've had a miraculous night, and they promise you an NBA career if you'll just allow them to represent you. The next thing you know, you've signed a piece of paper that probably signed away property. signed away earnings signed away things that even if you never make it into college or the pros all of a sudden now you are financially obligated to this person who took advantage of you so making agents register making them liable for deceitful information making them accountable to uh a federal law of fines is a first time federal law that will help us in cracking down on these bad actors. I wanna emphasize um a couple of points. First, I wanna thank Senator Hickenlooper for his unbelievable leadership in thinking about women in Olympic sports. I know he comes from a state where they care so much about women in Olympic sports, but uh the majority helped work with Senator Hickenlooper and the US OPC to not only protect our bill as it does, for uh the sports broadcasting act and future revenue going to women in olympic sports landmark provisions authored by senator hickenlooper and negotiated with the majority basically says that those women in olympic sports should be protected for the next nine years from the wealthiest divisions and from those who are more struggling for the next four years Why is that so important? It's important because we are already seeing cuts to thousands of women in Olympic sports, and we need, we need that, uh, we need them to be protected, um, throughout this. I will note that there was recent public polling that said that eighty-seven percent of the public think the number one priority here is not football. Believe it or not, a lot of this discussion is about football. Believe it or not, the number one thing the public cares about, eighty seven percent of the public, please protect women and Olympic sports. And that is exactly what this bill does, and so I want to thank Senator Hickenlooper for that. There's been much made in discussion about whether student athletes support this bill. Mister Chairman, I want to enter into the record a letter um from a student uh athlete advocacy group that basically represents five hundred thousand students in division one division two and division three committees who says the bills protections for student athletes at all divisions including transfer rights uh changes in college sports graduation and sexual harassment and sexual assault and harassment that this is uh great transparency on registration and and fees and important antitrust protection. So I wanna enter that into the record.

Without objection, it'll be admitted.

And there has been much made of late that somehow maybe the Congressional Black Caucus doesn't support us moving forward on this bill. They have not said that. That somehow maybe some other organizations uh that want to slow this issue down. I get that they definitely wanna slow down the SCORE Act. I join them in that effort. But I'd also like to enter into the record a letter from craig robinson who is the brother of michelle obama brother-in-law to the president of the united states who asks us to support this legislation because as he says he is a coach and a student athlete himself and he supports this legislation so i doubt the president's brother-in-law would be joining us in this effort if he thought anything in this act was untowards athletes or not a victory in moving forward the debate on how important it is to represent athletes' rights.

W- without objection, that will be admitted as well.

There are some people who think that doing nothing can lead to collective bargaining. And while I think I'm supportive of a concept, our witness before the committee thought that collective bargaining from the PAC-twelve is something, but I get the PAC-twelve is probably a state bottom-up approach that might work. But having a bottom-down approach here in the United States Senate where somehow somebody thinks we're going to pass a mandate by the federal government to say that state employees could somehow be mandated by the federal government to collectively bargain is not something that's going to happen anytime soon. Our legislation does though say, let's create a commission with students, with HBCUs, with the interested parties, and discuss what is the best foot forward for collective bargaining

Yeah.

or other options that can continue to solve some of our problems. So, Mister Chairman, there are some on our side who would have loved more time to deal with this bill. Clearly, it is complex. There are some that would hope that we would continue to make further changes. I commit to them that we are going to do that. But we need order and stability now. The craziness that is happening in this marketplace with cutting of thousands of roster slots the taxing students fees for education to pay for football the arms race that is basically taking money away from research and development our task here is to win the race in innovation against the chinese a one point four billion dollar one point four billion population we have five hundred thousand five hundred million in our country how are we gonna do that Because we have a better education system, and it's all over the country. But not, but not if we continue to let the demise of college sports not only take away athletes' rights, not only take away revenue, but also diminish our R and D capabilities, particularly at land grant institutions. So, Mister Chairman, I know we made big concessions last night to the Big Ten to make sure that they felt that this was a bill that helped protected their interest for the future i'm sure we're going to have many more conversations with them down the road but as uh my colleague senator wicker knows we've been working on this issue for a long time since his time as chairman of the committee and i just asked my colleagues to support this legislation today because it does have a few other little tools in here one it literally says you cannot block content in your region from being on over the air broadcasting. I am sick and tired of these people putting broadcast content of us seeing our favorite football team, all of a sudden you can't watch it because it's behind a paywall. That is not what the American consumer wants or deserves, and that protection in this legislation is landmark. I also think that the tool in this legislation to increase streaming media rights for non-revenue sports, women's volleyball, women's basketball, or uh rowing, that is historic at the University of Washington, allows those sports to go out and capitalize on revenue opportunities to grow their sport their attention and their future. So, mister chairman, this is landmark. i appreciate uh us working together i appreciate our colleagues moving this bill out of committee it's not the last uh that we're going to see the changes of this i encourage more dialogue with all our colleagues and i will certainly be communicating with the congressional black caucus on these issues but i certainly will be communicating with the rest of our our senate colleagues as well but um mister chairman i've said it many times i think you know you and i disagree on about twenty five things and that's just in this committee but we did not allow that disagreement to thwart progress on a critical subject and i think that anybody who thinks that there's another opportunity forward is going to be mistaken because i think we have seen from the ncaa and the conferences that they cannot cannot figure out how to get this structure Right. They need our help, they've asked for it, and today we're giving it. Thank you.

Thank you, and and uh I wanna sincerely thank ranking member Cantwell. Uh, you have been a partner in this project. This has been a very difficult project. You and I sat in conference rooms for six to eight hours a day, day after day after day, painstakingly negotiating each and every provision of this bill, and there were moments when i'm sure you wanted to throw me out a window uh and you restrained and

mmm

at times our staff were ready to throttle each other and and by the way we had had a secret that i would bring out Cuban coffee at that point and Cuban coffee is a wonderful tool of bribery that that calmed everyone down sugar and caffeine somehow got us back to work and so i i have appreciated the hard work and time and energy that you put into this bill uh we wouldn't be here without that um i know there are number of members who wanna make additional comments i'm gonna ask because we have a quorum present right now i'm gonna ask if we can uh move to the votes first and then i will stay as long as anyone wants to make comments uh after the votes uh but with that i i will recognize ranking member cantwell for an additional motion

yeah here if you if you want to here it is ok i move mr. chairman i move that s four six six eight the protect college sports act of twenty twenty six as amended by the cruz cantwell schmidt substitute as modified bud one as modified bud five as modified bud seven as modified capita one as modified curtis one as modified duckworth one as modified duckworth four as modified duckworth six as modified kim one luhan one as modified rosen one as modified rosen two sheehy one as modified sullivan one as modified wicker two as modified be favorably reported

is there a second

second

uh is there any discussion uh are there any amendments that uh people would like to introduce

We have to say.

Mr. Chairman.

Senator Baldwin.

Uh, Mr. Chairman, I have one amendment that I'd like to offer for a vote. I have uh an additional one that I'd like to offer for discussion and then withdraw, just so you know my plan of action here. Uh, for a vote I'd like to uh bring up Baldwin number three. And I'm happy to uh make a brief statement while it's being distributed.

Great.

Um, look the the primary goal of private equity firms is really to squeeze every penny out of an acquired asset. Private equity doesn't really care about an athlete's academic opportunities. Private equity doesn't care about team morale or the quality of coaching staff. Private equity doesn't care about preserving and growing women's and Olympic sports. Private equity doesn't care about the student or fan experience. They only care about how much money they can make. This should not be the objective of universities or their athletic departments. This amendment would simply prohibit schools from working with private equity to sell or license their media rights or in the operation of their athletic programs. And I encourage all my colleagues to support this amendment. Wouldn't ask for a roll call vote on it.

Thank you, Senator Baldwin. Uh, I appreciate the sentiment behind this amendment. Um, I'm I'm gonna vote no on it and I would encourage members to vote no on it. Uh, there's nothing in this bill that creates any uh, that speaks to private equity. But at the end of the day, colleges are all facing challenges. revenue challenges they're trying to support their athletes they're trying to support women's sports they're trying to support olympic sports and they're looking at a a range of possibilities i don't believe we should be foreclosing any of those possibilities uh i i think the issue certainly merits further discussion over time but but i don't think we should be enacting a a blanket prohibition right now

like the odds of it spreading

uh any further discussion ok the clerk will call the roll

mister thun

no by proxy

mister wicker

no mr. wicker

mrs. fisher

no mr. wicker

mister moran

no

mister sullivan mrs. blackburn

no

mister young

no mr. khan

mister bud

no

mister schmidt

no

mister curtis mister moreno

no

let me do whatever i can

mister sheehy

do whatever you want

no by proxy

missus capito miss lemus

no by proxy

miss cantwell

no

miss klobuchar

aye

mister schatz

no by proxy

mister markey

no by proxy

mister peters

aye

miss baldwin

aye

miss duckworth

uh no uh

what

yes by proxy

mr. rosen aye mister luke hahn aye mister hickenlooper no mister federman

aye by proxy

mister kim no miss blount rochester

uh yes by proxy

mister cruz

uh no

the no's are twenty the yes's are eight

uh the amendment is not agreed to uh are there further amendments

mister chairman

uh senator schmidt

thank you mr. chairman um i'm gonna offer but withdraw these two amendments schmidt three and schmidt four but let me give a brief explanation of what they are. I'm confident in working with this, with Senator Cruz and Cantwell and others as we have, that we're gonna find resolution on this. So we've got the two buckets, we've got the governance piece, and then we have potentially opening up new revenue opportunities, which is the second bucket. So both of these amendments address that issue. So the idea is that conferences could come to come together if they choose to pool their media rights. And so you go from a four billion dollar proposition to a, whatever the number is, certainly higher than four billion, to help support women's sports and olympic sports. So what Schmidt three does, would lower the threshold from seventy five percent to seventy percent of those member institutions effectively, allowing for um the conferences like the ACC, the Big Twelve, the Mountain West to be able to pool. If the threshold is seventy five percent, there are a couple of conferences that could block the pooling altogether. So, while I do not support forcing any conference into a pooling scenario, I wanna provide as many options as possible for conferences to pool if they choose. So that's what this would do. Uh, we're withdrawing that, but again I think we're we're very comfortable moving forward with the conversations that we've had. The second piece deals with the board composition if you go do it. If you go do it. So if we really want to incent, the reality of the situation is, if this is really gonna work, you really wanna have the Big Ten and the SEC as part of that. And In my view, we don't wanna force them to do it. I don't think there should be any effort, legal or otherwise, to force them to do it. But, we have to have an incentive structure in place that would provide the maximum opportunity for them to want to join. So the board composition of whatever this looks like really, really matters. And so Schmidt five would say that you, you're renegotiating that so the SEC and Big Ten would actually feel comfortable. So if this is really gonna work, you really wanna have everybody do it together. And that may or may not happen. Those conferences may choose, we don't wanna do it, we think we can get a better get a better deal, and that's fine. But we wanna provide the maximum runway for the conferences to be able to pull if they want to. But having said that, um, I will draw those two amendments and look forward to working with the chair and, um, my my two friends, Senator Cruz and Senator Cantwell.

Mister Chairman.

Yes. Uh, thank you, Senator Schmidt. Uh, Senator Cantwell.

i just wanna thank my colleague from missouri for his hard work on this and i certainly do wanna work with him uh in the future clearly getting this right so that schools and institutions across the country uh feel fairly represented in what is a distribution of revenue and a a process where we can move forward on maximizing more revenue why do we wanna do that because the analysis is there, that there is revenue that could be helpful to create stability. And personally, I like the marriage between college sports and local broadcasting. I wanna see more local broadcast stations survive. And being able to get this right is critical. So I look forward to working with my colleague.

Thank you. And Senator Baldwin, I apologize. You had two amendments and I moved away after one. That that was inadvertent, so I recognize Senator Baldwin again.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. i i intend to offer and then withdraw baldwin too uh which relates to uh how fans are able to watch their favorite teams play i suspect everyone in this room has heard about um frustrations from their constituents in trying to watch their favorite professional sports teams play um they are met with blackouts and paywalls. We did a quick calculation in Wisconsin, and if you want to be a superfan and watch every Packers game, every Brewers game, every Bucks game, you would literally have to pay fifteen hundred dollars a year in the various streaming services, It's not a problem. and you'd still potentially be faced with blackouts. Part of this has to do with the definition of um you know what's a local fan and what uh dma uh is um uh is is start with is involved um so for the packers in wisconsin for example that's just right green bay and milwaukee and not the rest of the state you have to pay to access otherwise

yes

i have a bill to handle that but i'm not bringing that bill up today but it's called the for the fans act so take a look um What I am bringing up is the definition of local. Because we should not allow for these frustrations to be expanded to college sports. This amendment would ensure that all fans across the state are able to watch their favorite college teams play, without having to deal with the frustration of blackouts and paywalls, and a maze of different subscription services that are so pervasive in uh professional sports. Limiting free access to one or possibly two media markets works generally for states west of the Rockies. To those of us east of the Rockies, we know that our media markets are a jumbled mess that cover far fewer square miles, and they often cross state lines. This amendment ensures equal access by expanding the definition of local Ah. to include the whole state and gives the FCC the ability to add to that definition of local. Uh, this would ensure all Wisconsinites can watch the Badgers play without being gouged by paywalls and subscriptions, and it would have similar benefits in other states. I'm gonna submit for the record a a map of the uh the the markets available uh currently Um, I will not ask for a vote on this amendment, but I think it's a very serious issue that we also are advocates for local broadcasting and advocates for the fans of these teams.

Thank you, Senator Baldwin. Uh, Senator Blackburn.

Thank you, Mister Chairman, I know that many of us have worked for years trying to deal with the NCAA and address some of the issues that have arisen because they have not been able to address this issue. And I've got two amendments that we are not going to vote on today, and I'm not going to call them up for a vote. But they are issues that need to be addressed because this is an issue that is languished. What are we going to do about college sports? And the ineptness of the NCAA has brought us to this point. But let's get some things right. Now, Blackburn, one would expand the bill's broadcast provisions from the NCAA men's and women's basketball tournament to any post-season activity. And we need to think in a more fulsome way about this and look at any activity for men and women's sports rather than getting to some point in the future and saying why did we carve out basketball and not cover baseball, not cover women's softball, not cover tennis. So, so, I don't know if anybody watched the women's college softball tournament this year. It was great. But I think we need to think a little bit more fully about those rights. The second one that I was offering deals with the sovereign immunity clause of the colleges. Now, in this bill that is before us, protecting college sports, what we're asking the colleges to do is to take on new responsibility. The way the bill is written What it does not do is protect both the state and federal sovereign immunity rights. And, Mister Chairman, I think this is something that we should revisit before we take this bill to the floor. We need to make certain that we are protecting, we need to clarify that we are protecting both the state and federal sovereign immunity rights.

Thank you. Senator Klobuchar.

Yeah. I wanted to just briefly comment uh Senator Baldwin's uh discussion about the markets and how they're different state by state. And I think I so appreciate the work you two have done on this bill and the reforms that are significant steps in the right direction especially the heightened health and safety standards that work to protect athletes to focus on women athletes. Um, and so what Senator Baldwin was talking about may be unique in certain states. And that's why I'm hoping that the two of you, uh, coming from states that are not in these markets, um, would consider working with us in the future, because in Minnesota, um, we have, say, five markets, and these fans in these markets might be very as much a fan of our college sports teams as one in the immediate market. and they're not covered by this and so what worries me for um our local broadcasters here is they're already hanging on against these paid um steamers monopolies and then the fans get hurt because all the content is behind a paywall and so what i hope you will do is work with us on this issue um of some other issues that are specific to the big ten of course about an legal settlement and things like

Senator Cantwell had a brief comment and then we're gonna move to vote.

OK.

mister chairman quickly i wanted to say a couple of housekeeping things one uh senator markey wants to be a yes on baldwin two i might have misstated that um

he'll be recorded as yes

baldwin three baldwin three it's baldwin three baldwin three

baldwin three he'll be recorded as yes on baldwin three

thank you so much and i wanted to say um i wanna continue to work on baldwin three i do think there are some current university contracts that would might be unwound if we had passed that language but clearly support her larger efforts and certainly uh want to work on the media issue with her i i uh we've had success in this committee um senator klobuchar has also brought up this issue that we do want less content behind the paywall and more content with broadcasting the language in the bill clearly gives us the ability to do that by saying if we are going to give an antitrust exemption, we're only giving that antitrust exemption if the public gets something in return. What are we getting from the Sports Broadcasting Act of nineteen sixty, which gave this original exemption, is the right to basically say that the content has to be on broadcast. And so, this is critically important to the bill, and so I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues on all of that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. And if there's no further discussion, uh the question is on senator cantwell's motion uh the clerk will call the roll

mister thune pass

aye by proxy

mister wicker pass mrs. fisher

aye

mister moran aye mister sullivan aye mrs. blackburn

with a blank hesitation yes we call the roll

the box

the game

asking mister young

no

mister bud

aye

mister schmidt

aye

mister curtis

aye

mister moreno

aye

mister sheehy

yes aye by proxy

mrs. capito miss loomis

aye

miss cantwell

aye

miss klobuchar

no

mister schatz

ok

aye by proxy

mister markey

no by proxy

mister peters

no

miss baldwin

no

miss duckworth

no by proxy no by proxy

miss rosen

aye mmm

mister lujan

aye

mister hickenlooper

aye by proxy aye by proxy

mister federman

i'm right aye by proxy

mister kim miss blunt rockchester

no by proxy no by proxy

mister cruise

aye mr. chairman i vote no

mister wicker

no

the yes's are eighteen the no's are nine

uh the motion is agreed to uh and it will be reported to the floor Uh, I now recognize ranking member Cantwell for an additional motion.

Mister Chairman, I move that PN six two two four, PN six five eight, PN seven nine one, PN eight four five, PN eight four eight, PN eight four nine, PN eight seven six, PN nine O eight, p n nine O nine p n nine two nine p n ten seven seven uh coast guard promotions be favorably reported

is there a second

second

all those in favor say aye

aye

aye those opposed say no the motion is agreed to and the nomination is ordered to be favorably reported uh i ask for unanimous consent that staff are authorized to make technical and conforming changes without objections so ordered and then i was told a number of members wish to speak and the first on the list is senator klobuchar

oh and then can i be added to the list mr. chairman

sure

uh i made my remarks but i again wanna thank both of you and we're really hopeful we can work with you uh to get to a place uh uh my vote just because the work you're doing is so important but then few weeks here without um being able to get the midwest input that we think we need um think would be very helpful and i hope we get to yes thanks

what

uh senator moran

chairman sorry yeah chairman

chairman just one moment

nineteen

i cleaned up after myself

let me just clarify right before senator moran the final vote the the total was nineteen to nine so that that number was just wanna clarify that for the record

Chairman Cruz and Ranking Member Cantwell, uh, I'm not unfamiliar with this topic, and uh, I used this moment to congratulate, commend you for reaching a conclusion that is uh broadly supported. Uh, a lot of issues uh arise with this topic, and you've dealt with many of them, including some of the most difficult. Uh, as we heard from our colleagues, there's other interests that yet need to be considered. But I uh congratulate you on your success, cuz I know how difficult uh, it was and can be. I wanna just in- encourage you to continue to work with the members of this committee, but I'm, uh, pleased with the product that you've been able to achieve. In, uh, all these efforts and all the opportunities that I've had to be engaged in this issue, the goal has been to improve the lot in life, uh, for circumstances of students who are student athletes, to create opportunities for them and to create, uh, guidelines for the universities that they attend universities and colleges, to take care of um women and sports that are considered uh not the major sports at universities, uh to make sure that we're uh using our college athletes as an opportunity to increase the number of um individuals who are capable and willing to compete in the United States Olympic team, uh the consequences that occur on college campuses when it involves student athletes, uh that experience uh and its importance uh resounds across the country in ways way beyond the stadium that we're in, or the basketball court that we're sitting on, or the tennis match that we're watching in our home communities, in our home universities and colleges. Uh, and I've always had an interest in trying to make sure that, uh, historically black colleges and community colleges, uh, have the opportunity to to, uh, have student athletes achieve great success in those settings. So, thank you for knowing the importance of this issue. working so hard and diligently uh to reach conclusions. And um it is a it is a great uh monumental achievement uh particularly in today's environment uh that you've now uh brought to us. I do want to underscore what I said in the in the hearing. I made remarks uh that expressing my uh concern about broadcast provisions in this bill. I heard a number of my colleagues speak to that. I know that Senator Cantwell She said something that uh she and I have worked on before is trying to make sure that our hometown broadcasters uh have a future. Uh, this bill that I that what I spoke about in this bill during our our hearing was particularly considering the implications of streaming services. I'm pleased to see this bill in this bill that we're relying upon the same definition. The definition that I'm talking about is sponsored telecasting as the original, as it is in the original nineteen sixty-one sports broadcasting act. Sponsored telecasting was intended and interpreted as free over-the-air, ad-supported broadcast television, notably not accounting for or including streaming services. I continue to believe that we should promote sports on broadcast, as that is the best way to make certain that all fans have access to watch their favorite teams. I want the record of this uh this mark-up, this executive committee meeting, reflect this narrow and deliberate definition that you are utilizing. I look forward to continuing the conversation on this topic. I'm glad to see the common sense rights and guardrails, as well as protections for Olympic sports. And I supported the substitute amendment amendment, which made it uh easier for me to be supportive of the entire bill, based upon the changes included in that substitute amendment. Can I see something about that? And again, I commend you on your success. Can I see something about that?

Uh, thank you, Senator Moran, Senator Kepner.

Well, I just want I wanna

I'm sorry, I can't well, sorry.

I just wanna thank Senator Moran for his leadership. Um, he is uh, been consistent on this issue for many, many years, and and I appreciate it. Um, you know, nineteen to nine sounds like a Seahawk uh, football score. Um, but I think today we're proving that we are resilient in keeping this product moving. And um, I know that my colleagues have concerns both about the sec and big ten but what we did today is say we are not going to let the most powerful richest conferences dictate to the rest of america what's going to happen to five hundred thousand athletes we are going to make sure that the voices of people are heard everywhere so i i wanna thank my colleagues uh who uh are trying to help us move this forward in the debate and i wanna certainly thank senator rosen for her contributions on this because she's been uh Uh, I know she's dealing with boxing issues too, but she's been really helpful, so we really appreciate her. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.