The sent out an email asking athletes to support the Protect College Sports Act (PCSA). It is being marketed as a way to protect college sports, but the real question should be: who is protecting the athletes?
Without athletes, there is no sport.
Giving absolute power to a centralized institution feels more like an economic cartel than fair competition. And it will be the athletes who pay the price.
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Fair competition is what makes sport great. The PCSA gives the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) complete control over who gets to compete. Is that fair to the athletes and fans who pay to watch and participate?
As a five-time Olympian, I have spent more than two decades competing in a system that promised fair competition and athlete protection. Like every athlete, I trusted those institutions to uphold the integrity of sport. Too often, they havent.
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In 2014, Russia was proven to have cheated in the Sochi Olympic Games. I was awarded an Olympic medal on paper, only to have mine â and 27 others â returned to Russia through a flawed arbitration process. Leading into the 2026 Olympics, an independent tribunal found that Canada intentionally manipulated Olympic qualification points, yet nothing was done. Most have heard of the Larry Nassar scandal, where the USOPC and NCAA failed to protect athletes despite years of complaints. Not to mention the recent controversy surrounding Imane Khelif, an Olympic boxer classified as having Difference of Sex Development (DSD). Khelif reportedly has XY chromosomes, but won women’s gold at the Paris Olympics, raising questions about competitive integrity and institutional accountability.
These are different scandals with different players, but they reveal the same pattern: justice delayed and justice denied. Congress is considering granting the NCAA a federal antitrust exemption, in exchange for the NCAA promising to regulate itself. But what has the NCAA done to demonstrate that it is capable of policing itself? Today, the NCAA and its member universities have more than 260 open Title IX investigations involving the mishandling of sexual assault and misconduct. Congress and the Supreme Court have repeatedly been forced to intervene because the NCAA has failed to self-regulate. Why should we believe that giving the NCAA more power and legal protection would suddenly produce a different result? More importantly, how does this protect athletes?
The PCSA would ultimately strip athletes of the ability to challenge the NCAA and allow the organization to define what constitutes “reasonable” action to prevent abuse. Institutions that have failed to protect athletes should not receive additional legal protections and more power. Giving more power without meaningful accountability creates a dangerous imbalance. History shows that power imbalances lead to abuse, which is why antitrust laws exist.
Without the private right to challenge these institutions and their policies, athletes are left vulnerable to scandal. The more than 260 open Title IX cases involving sexual assault and misconduct would be neutralized with this act passing, leaving institutions without accountability, and athletes harmed. The act grants col
