The Senate failed to reach a vote on the Protect College Sports Act after an all-night, pre-recess session Saturday.
According to ESPN, the chamber has slated the bill for another vote in September when the Senate is back from its summer break.
The measure has been touted as one that would put guardrails around an escalating spending spree in college sports as the industry struggles to adapt to a new model in which teams can pay players.
"College sports is something that needs to be fixed. They have a good solution," said majority leader John Thune (R-S.D.), "We got it teed up for next month."
The bill recently gained the support of the Big Ten and SEC.
If the bill does pass the Senate, it will still have to make it through the House, which is more narrowly divided and tried for months to bring the less athlete-friendly SCORE Act to a vote and failed repeatedly.
The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation released revised text of the Protect College Sports Act on Aug. 4 following the public endorsements from the Southeastern and Big Ten Conferences.
Less than two months after the introduction of the legislation and just over five weeks since an overwhelmingly bipartisan committee vote (19-9) to advance the bill, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Ranking Member Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), and Senator Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) struck an agreement on modified language.
Changes to the legislation include:
- Adopted the House Settlement definition of “Associated Entity”;
- Ensured a “hard” revenue share cap; closed off loopholes and ensured associated entity deals count towards the cap;
- Added certification requirements for multimedia rights holders (MMRs), sponsors, apparel companies, and vendors to ensure legitimate NIL deals;
- Increased NIL deal transparency;
- Eliminates improper compensation to recruit high school athletes;
- Established a $22.5 million retention fund, with up to $5 million in additional retention spending unlocked dollar-for-dollar by NIL spending on women’s and Olympic sports, for a maximum of $27.5 million;
- Added more flexibility to cut down on tampering and improper recruitment practices;
- Clarified participation in pooled media entity is voluntary;
- Clarified traditional rivalry scheduling requirements are only for members of the pooled media entity;
- Closed the private equity loophole for forming a super league; and
- Protected conference movement and expansion subject to 19 institution cap for large conferences.
