The surprising issue dividing Senate Dems right now
The bill dividing Democrats is the Protect College Sports Act, which the Senate voted to advance on Thursday. The bill attempts to regulate the lucrative world of college sports by setting a cap on payments to athletes, placing a five-year limit on playing eligibility, and giving the National Collegiate Athletic Association, or NCAA, an antitrust exemption. Supporters of the bill say that it will bring order to the world of college sports, setting rules on how athletes can use the transfer portal, stopping a “spending spiral” by schools, and putting an end to lawsuits on these issues.
Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, an outspoken Democratic supporter of the bill, agreed that the bill does more good than harm. “On balance, this is a compromise that secures a lot of significant benefits and protections for college athletes,” he told The New Republic on Thursday. When asked what he thought about his colleagues who were concerned about the antitrust exemption, he mumbled wryly: “Good for them.”
Vaheesan, along with lawmakers like Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, are concerned that this legislation could reverse these recent financial wins for student athletes. “I think we’re going to rue the day we gave an antitrust exemption this big to the colleges,” Murphy said. “It’s going to result in a huge cost increase for consumers and for folks who follow college sports on TV.”
Coons argued that the bill isn’t too deferential to the interests of colleges. “They did not get the definition of college athletes as never being employees, which was one of the top asks of the conferences and colleges,” he said. “That was a concession to those of us who are strong supporters of organized labor and want to retain the possibility to organize.”
“It does raise concerns about how committed members of the Senate, including Senate Democrats, are to the well-being and welfare of workers,” Vaheesan said.
Outside Washington
Surging gas prices are dominating headlines this week, particularly across the Midwest. In Michigan, gas prices jumped 22 cents from Wednesday to Thursday, drawing worryingly close to $5 a gallon, with further hikes predicted. (Average prices in Minnesota rose 14 cents in the same 24-hour period. In Cincinnati, Ohio, prices jumped 25 cents overnight between Tuesday and Wednesday.) At the Detroit Free Press on Thursday, Frank Witsil reported new calculations from Brown University professor Jeff Colgan estimating that since the start of Trump’s war on Iran, American households have paid on average $826 more on gas than they would have without the conflict. Susan Tompor of the same paper reported a troubling new trend of free gas and free groceries scams. “This summer,” writes Tompor, “the Better Business Bureau Scam Tracker page received reports from consumers who complained that they received postcards claiming they qualified for valuable gas and grocery gift cards and vouchers,” from the mysteriously named “AAPP”—which can look like “AARP” if people are reading quickly. Those who followed the instructions “complained that they lost money once they paid a $5 processing fee. Some consumers saw additional unauthorized charges of $46 or more being taken out of their accounts.” Analysts predict that prices will remain high for months to come—with record diesel prices rapidly affecting the rest of the economy via their impact on trucking and farming.
—Heather Souvaine Horn
Friday at 1 p.m., a webcast at the Center for Strategic and International Studies asks: “Is U.S. Economic Diplomacy Up to Speed?” The question may feel bleakly comical against the backdrop of Trump tariffs, the economic shocks of the Iran war, and speculation that Canada might join the EU just to piss Trump off. But Enoh T. Ebong, Allison Lombardo, and Jonathan Gandomi, according to CSIS’s event summary, will focus on a broader, more process-oriented issue: whether the State Department is ready to participate in a new era of negotiations over “critical minerals supply chains … technology standards,” and more. “While the State Department’s role has expanded significantly,” the organization’s event summary states, “its internal structures have not kept pace, leaving expertise fragmented across nearly 20 agencies without strong coordination.”
In Closing
Good Week/Bad Week
Sure, the middling rapper got booted from his supporting slot on Ed Sheeran’s tour because of his pro-Palestinian statement during a performance at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium—that’s bad news for him financially. But his righteous stance is being applauded worldwide, and other Sheeran opening acts followed suit. Plus, when was the last time everyone was talking about Macklemore? (Never.)
We knew his music was an abomination. Now we know that his politics are too. Booting an artist from your tour because he said “Free Palestine” does not make you “apolitical”; it makes you an explicit opponent of Palestine’s self-determination, and a craven lickspittle of the corporate entertainment complex.
Political Trivia Question of the Day
With Texas on our minds: Three speakers of the House in the twentieth century, all Democrats, hailed from Texas. Who were they? One is really hard—he was speaker for just one term. One was speaker for nearly two decades. The third’s tenure ended in (ginned-up) scandal. (Sign up for The TNR Blue Book to find the answer in Tuesday’s newsletter.)
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