The National Independent Venue Association (NIVA) and Fan Alliance are calling on Congress to pass legislation to help prevent the kind of price gouging fans are facing with FIFA World Cup tickets and more.
The two entities sent a joint letter to House and Senate leadership on Thursday (June 18), calling on Congress to act in the wake of reports of fans paying thousands of dollars for World Cup tickets and still not making it into the matches. The letter went to House Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate majority leader John Thune, House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate minority leader Charles Schumer.
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“Outside the gates of World Cup games happening in 11 cities across the U.S., your constituents and visitors from across the globe have not been able to get into the games they have spent hundreds or thousands of dollars to attend, while Congress has yet to ban speculative or ghost ‘tickets,’” the letter reads. “A speculative, or ghost, ‘ticket’ is the listing and/or sale of a license to enter a live event that is not actually in the possession by the reseller.”
It continues: “Instead of showcasing America’s ability to host the world’s largest sporting event, less than a week into the 2026 World Cup, the international conversation has become one of cancelled tickets, fraudulent listings, fans turned away at the gates, and consumers left holding thousands of dollars in unrecoverable travel costs.”
NIVA and Fan Alliance are urging Congress to ban speculative tickets through legislation. They are asking that any bill include the language, “A reseller shall not sell or offer to sell speculative tickets, tickets not in the possession of the reseller.” The letter points to states like Maryland, Maine, Minnesota, Oregon, Connecticut, Vermont and Nevada, “which have already banned speculative sales outright and closed the loopholes that let resellers relabel the same scam as a ‘concierge’ or ‘ticket procurement’ service.”
The letter also asks Congress to place universal price-gouging limitations on ticket resale and ensure stringent Federal Trade Commission (FTC) fines of no less than $10,000 per ticket, per day, for those violating those prospective bans.
While Congress is currently considering the TICKET Act — a bill that would require transparency and disclosure of ticket pricing and fees, ban deceptive marketing practices and require refunds for canceled or postponed events — NIVA and Fan Alliance contend that this legislation would still permit the speculative ticketing happening now.
“We warned that consumers would purchase tickets that did not exist. We warned that families would travel thousands of miles only to discover their tickets could not be delivered. We warned that refunds would not make consumers whole after airfare, hotels, rental cars, parking, and other travel expenses. Unfortunately, every one of those warnings has become a reality on the world’s biggest sporting stage,” the letter, signed by NIVA executive director Stephen Parker and Fan Alliance executive director Donald Cohen, in reference to the World Cup.
“While the World Cup is drawing national attention to speculative ticketing, this same consumer harm occurs every single day at independently owned venues, theaters, festivals, comedy clubs, and performing arts centers across America,” the letter continues. “Unlike FIFA, the NFL, or major professional leagues, these small businesses and non-profits are not billion-dollar organizations capable of absorbing the reputational damage created by speculative ticket sellers. Fans blame the venue, artists lose goodwill, and local businesses lose revenue despite having done nothing wrong.”
The joint letter also calls for legislation that would require secondary ticketing platforms to produce data on ticket fulfillment, replacement requests, refunds, consumer complaints and professional reseller activity.
Read the full letter here.
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