[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 14 (Wednesday, January 21, 2026)]
[House]
[Pages H1157-H1158]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
COLLEGE SPORTS
(Ms. STEVENS asked and was given permission to address the House for
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
Ms. STEVENS. Mr. Speaker, after Monday's college football national
championship, I rise to express my concern about the trend of private
equity firms attempting to buy up college sports. These deals will be
bad for athletes, students, and fans.
We have seen this play before. Media corporations' pursuit of college
football and basketball viewers created nonsensical conference
realignment that destroyed the regional nature of
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college sport. For generations, the Big Ten was known as the Midwestern
Conference. In recent decades, that identity has slowly been eroded as
coastal schools were admitted in the name of more revenue and higher
profits.
Now private equity is looking to buy college sports revenue streams.
If these deals are normalized, it is only a matter of time before
private investors demand control over our university athletic
departments. This creates the risk of further conference realignment,
cutting nonrevenue sports, and expanding for-profit influence over
universities.
This is why I have sent a letter with my Republican colleagues to end
the NCAA.
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