KEY TAKEAWAYS
- President Trump’s Department of Education rescinded a Biden-era memo that said Name, Image, and Likeness payments must be given in proportion to the number of male and female student-athletes at a given school.
- The Biden-administration memo said NIL payments are financial assistance and must align with Title IX policies.
- If approved by a judge in April, colleges can share up to $20.5 million with their athletes. Today’s action means NIL payments would not have to be proportional to the number of students of each sex participating in athletics at that school.
The Trump administration on Wednesday tackled the multibillion-dollar business of compensating collegiate athletes, cancelling a Biden-era memo that ordered proportionate payments for men and women.
In the last days of President Joe Biden’s term, the Department of Education issued a memo that said Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) payments are financial assistance and “under Title IX, must be made available to male and female student-athletes in a manner that is substantially proportionate to the number of students of each sex participating in interscholastic or intercollegiate athletics at that school.”
President Donald Trump’s Department of Education rescinded that memo, stating Title IX does not apply to compensation for student-athletes. The move could shake up NIL programs in a marketplace that, in just a few years, has meant big dollars for high-profile athletes at large universities, as well as money for lesser-known ones at smaller schools.
“The claim that Title IX forces schools and colleges to distribute student-athlete revenues proportionately based on gender equity considerations is sweeping and would require clear legal authority to support it. That does not exist,” said Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the Department of Education, in a statement.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association did not immediately return a request for comment. It had for decades restricted college athletes from accepting money for endorsements and advertisements, a policy that began to change in 2021.
The NCAA recently agreed to a court settlement that, if approved by a judge this spring, would allow the biggest schools to create a pool of $20.5 million in the first year to share with athletes. The majority of these funds were expected to go to football and men’s basketball players, but Biden’s memo in January forced many schools to re-do their revenue-sharing plans.