Sponsor
Michael Baumgartner
Representative · R-WA
Representative · R-WA
Official title: To protect the name, image, and likeness rights of, and provide protections for, student athletes and to promote fair competition among intercollegiate athletics, and for other purposes.
Introduced June 4, 2026 by Michael Baumgartner · Last progress June 4, 2026
The bill substantially expands athlete rights, safety protections, and revenue/visibility guarantees—giving student‑athletes more NIL freedom, medical coverage, and voice—while shifting sizable compliance, litigation, and governance costs and competition risks onto institutions, donors, taxpayers, and smaller programs.
Current and recent student‑athletes can freely market and earn for their name, image, and likeness (NIL) and gain stronger contractual protections (written contracts, fee limits, agent rules), reducing exploitation and increasing earning opportunity.
Student‑athletes with sport‑related long‑term conditions and Division I athletes receive expanded medical protection (guaranteed post‑eligibility coverage with a national funding floor and improved immediate/catastrophic coverage), improving long‑term financial and medical safety.
Transfer and eligibility rules are standardized nationally (including one free transfer and federal preemption of conflicting state rules), reducing patchwork regulation and making mobility and compliance simpler for athletes and institutions.
Colleges, conferences, and associations will face substantial new compliance, reporting, insurance, and administrative costs (implementation, ombuds staff, safety officers, program funding) that could be passed to students, taxpayers, or athletic budgets.
The bill expands private litigation risk (new private rights of action, whistleblower suits, bans on predispute arbitration and waivers) likely increasing lawsuits, legal fees, and court caseloads for institutions, associations, agents and others.
Reporting and public databases for NIL and finances (including disclosure thresholds) create privacy risks—if anonymization or data handling fails, student‑athletes could suffer inadvertent privacy harms or misuse of sensitive information.
Based on analysis of 4 sections of legislative text.
Requires funded post‑eligibility medical benefits, mandatory health/safety and abuse‑prevention standards, conditional antitrust exemption for joint media‑rights sales, and private enforcement with whistleblower protections.
Creates new federal protections and requirements for intercollegiate athletics: requires funded post‑eligibility medical coverage for serious sport‑related conditions, mandates health, safety, and abuse‑prevention standards, conditions a limited antitrust exemption for jointly marketed college broadcasting rights on compliance, and adds private‑cause and whistleblower protections with pre‑suit notice and state‑law preemption rules. Implements new definitions for covered parties (including broad "associated entity" language), deadlines for institutional compliance, and structural changes to the Sports Broadcasting Act to allow collective media‑rights arrangements if the new safety, governance, and funding requirements are met.