President Donald Trump is considering an executive order that would change the NIL landscape of college sports after meeting with former Alabama football coach Nick Saban, it has emerged.
Trump spoke at Alabama’s commencement on Thursday and met privately with Saban, the legendary coach who won seven NCAA national championships.
And according to the Wall Street Journal, Trump will look at signing a new executive order after Saban criticized NIL’s effect on the college sports landscape.
In the WSJ’s wording – citing anonymous White House officials – Saban believes that college sports has been ‘damaged’ by the influx of money surrounding NIL, which was introduced in 2021 as a way to allow student-athletes to be compensated.
Saban is said to believe that the ‘name, image and likeness’ deals – which are now frequently used by big schools to outbid competitors for top players – result in an uneven playing field.
The 73-year-old, who retired from coaching last January, reportedly proposed ‘reforming’ NIL rather than ending it entirely.
President Donald Trump and former Alabama head coach Nick Saban met to talk about NIL
The likes of Livvy Dunne and Shedeur Sanders have raked in millions in NIL deals
Trump is said to agree with Saban’s thoughts regarding NIL and told his aides to begin looking into the potential language of such an order.
Another former college football coach, Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, also shared on social media that he had discussed NIL with the Commander-in-Chief.
After decades of college athletes being unable to cash in on their name, NIL helped the likes of Livvy Dunne, Caitlin Clark, Shedeur Sanders and more become millionaires while still in school.
Last year, the NCAA also agreed to a $2.8billion settlement to allow schools to directly pay current and former players, though the class-action case is still pending.
Besides making certain athletes rich, the NIL system has also had some massive knock-on effects.
With players no longer having to sit a season after transferring – and not bound by any sort of long- term contracts – the ‘transfer portal’ has allowed players to freely test their market for NIL deals with other schools or even pressure their current schools for more money.
Schools also do not receive any sort of compensation if and when a player they helped develop bolts for a bigger program.
Additionally, NIL has created an odd transition between college and pro sports – especially in the women’s game – where many athletes are making more in the college ranks.
Clark, for example, made millions in college with the help of Gatorade and State Farm NIL deals, but made just over $76,000 as a rookie-scale base salary in the WNBA.
Nonetheless, the implementation of NIL allowed the likes of Dunne to build enormous brands off of the social media followings.
Trump addressed the graduates of the University of Alabama on Thursday night
Trump has previously displayed an interest in college sports, as he attended the 2018 College Football Playoff final in 2018 and other games in Alabama in 2019 and 2024, the WSJ noted.
Their report came after Trump delighted Alabama grads by continuing to wage his war against trans athletes in women’s sports.
The president, who signed an executive order in February banning trans women from women’s sports, said he would ‘always protect women’s sports’ as the crowd in Tuscaloosa loudly applauded.
‘They say it’s an 80-20 issue. No, it’s a 97-3 issue, I think,’ Trump said.
‘No, men will not be playing in women’s sports. I said that, and I classified it with a very powerful executive order, as you know. It’s done.’
He went on to rail against several trans controversies in women’s sports, including in boxing, volleyball and swimming.
Trump has vowed to strip federal funding from schools who defy his executive order and in March halted $175 million in federal funding to UPenn for allowing trans swimmer Lia Thomas to previously compete against biological women.
His administration has also now given the school an ultimatum to wipe Thomas from its women’s record book and apologize.
The White House has accused Penn of violating sex discriminations law Title IX by ‘denying women equal opportunities by permitting males to compete in women’s intercollegiate athletics and to occupy women-only intimate facilities.’
