In an executive order the White House billed as an effort to “save college sports,” President Donald Trump issued an executive order Friday aimed at the NCAA, student-athletes’ use of the transfer portal and other eligibility issues.
The order calls on “the interstate intercollegiate athletic governing body for higher education institutions” to establish age-based eligibility limits, including a sports participation window of “no more than a five-year period.”
Under the order, athletes would be allowed one free transfer to another school, and one additional transfer upon obtaining a four-year degree. The order also puts the onus on the NCAA to create a national registry of player agents and to institute policies protecting opportunities, including scholarships, within women’s and Olympic sports from being negatively impacted by revenue-sharing.
The order is effective Aug. 1.
The executive order comes after the creation last month of five presidential committees that will attempt to reform college sports. It’s been a topic of attention at the White House in recent weeks, as Trump also hosted a “Saving College Sports” roundtable that featured the likes of Nick Saban, Tiger Woods and all power-conference commissioners.
“Absent a comprehensive national solution, therefore, the escalating financial demands to succeed in football and basketball combined with the significantly loosened rules governing eligibility, transfers, and pay-for-play schemes may force curtailment of women’s and Olympics sports, and may even jeopardize the overall financial well-being of universities with which the Federal Government has important financial relationships,” one passage of the executive order reads.
The issue will be enforcement. In the past, Trump has used the threat of pulling federal funds to get universities to comply with his policy desires.
The NCAA has largely been unable to enforce its rules since a 2021 Supreme Court case, NCAA v. Alston, found the governing body was not exempt from federal antitrust laws. NCAA decisions, particularly those pertaining to athlete eligibility, have been taken to court and overturned.
One line in the executive order said the NCAA’s bylaws should ensure that “professional athletes cannot return to college athletics.”
Some players from the NBA’s developmental league, the G League, have successfully returned to the college ranks, while former Alabama center Charles Bediako, who had at one point signed an NBA contract, received a temporary restraining order to return to the Crimson Tide earlier this season. He played in five games before a Tuscaloosa Circuit Court judge overturned the ruling; Bediako later dropped his legal challenge.
NCAA president Charlie Baker, who has sought Trump’s help in the past, acknowledged the order in a statement.
“The NCAA has modernized college sports to deliver more benefits for student-athletes, and the Executive Order reinforces many of our mandatory protections — including guaranteed health care coverage, mental health services, and scholarship protections.
“This action is a significant step forward, and we appreciate the Administration’s interest and attention to these issues. Stabilizing college athletics for student-athletes still requires a permanent, bipartisan federal legislative solution, so we look forward to continuing to work alongside the Administration and Congress to enact targeted legislation with the support of student-athlete leaders from all three divisions.”
