One of President Donald Trump’s forthcoming executive orders could target NIL payments in college football after he met with former Alabama head coach Nick Saban.
President Trump is considering an executive order “that could increase scrutiny of the explosion in payments to college athletes since 2021,” according to The Wall Street Journal.
That comes after a meeting between the President and Saban at the University of Alabama commencement address in recent days.
Saban, college football’s record-holder seven-time national champion head coach, supports NIL as a concept, but has criticized the way in which the policy has been implemented nationwide.
Saban has referred to the existing NIL model in college football as unsustainable, as it creates a sharply uneven playing field between schools with more resources and those with less.
President Trump said he agreed with Saban and would look at creating an executive order, going as far as asking aides to study what a prospective order would say on the subject.
Like most executive orders, for it to really stick legally, the President would likely need the U.S. Congress to get directly involved and hash out the details in a piece of federal legislation.
Opinion is split among lawmakers regarding how to handle the situation, but one piece of legislation has been proposed that could completely change the system.
Rep. Michael Baumgartner, a Republican from Washington state, has proposed H.R. 2663, the “Restore College Sports Act,” which seeks to replace the NCAA entirely with a new body headed by a commissioner that is appointed by the President of the United States.
The bill also proposes that players be allowed to transfer freely, and that NIL funds and revenues be shared with schools and distributed “equally among all student athletes of such institutions.”
A potential order on NIL payments comes at a time when the landmark House vs. NCAA case is expected to be resolved soon, the decision of which will formally permit colleges to pay athletes directly, with football players expected to receive the bulk of that revenue.
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