The United States House of Representatives Judiciary Committee has released an interim report evaluating the NFL’s antitrust exemption under the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, raising new questions about the league’s future.
The preliminary report, which can be read in full here, comes two days before the Committee will hold a full hearing on the Sports Broadcasting Act (SBA).
The SBA affords the NFL an antitrust exemption that allows the league to pool television rights together among its 32 teams. When the act was signed, according to the report, “The NFL argued that an exemption would allow the league to sign a $4.65 million per year broadcasting agreement that would provide a viable and fair amount of money to each team and make sure that fans could continue to watch games on broadcast television.”
The report argues that the NFL has used the antitrust exemption to build out its lucrative television rights structure and that removing the exemption would make it significantly cheaper for fans to watch the NFL.
This was the central argument of a class-action lawsuit brought in 2015, which argued that the NFL Sunday Ticket out-of-market service was a violation of antitrust law because the league colluded with its broadcast partners to require Sunday Ticket be priced unreasonably high to protect the NFL’s Sunday afternoon broadcasters, CBS and Fox. A jury initially ruled against the NFL in 2024, but the judge later overturned the verdict, and the case is now on appeal.
The committee report argues that the league’s claim that NFL Sunday Ticket is a product for avid fans, rather than one primarily purchased by out-of-market fans out of necessity, is untrue.
“Despite the NFL’s claims, the Sunday Ticket is largely not a product for the avid fan of NFL football in general; rather, it is a product bought mostly by fans attempting to watch their favorite team who are stuck with no other option. According to data from former Sunday Ticket subscribers, when asked, ‘Why did you sign up for NFL Sunday Ticket?,’ over 70 percent of respondents answered that they subscribed to ‘watch my favorite team, which is out of market.’”
The NFL says that Sunday Ticket is priced the way it is to encourage fans to watch their home team over the air locally.
The hearing comes as many corners of the federal government continue to put pressure on the NFL and its antitrust exemption.
Some have alleged that the pressure campaign is designed to ensure the NFL, which is angling to renew its television agreements several years early, continues to air the majority of games on broadcast television, rather than sell more games to streamers.
The effort to combat the fragmentation of live sports is popular among fans. A March 2026 poll by Fox News found that 72% of sports fans think major sports events should be required to air on free broadcast television, and nearly 60% have not watched a sporting event because it was too expensive.
Losing its antitrust exemption would have major financial implications for the NFL, as it would dramatically change how the league packages and sells its broadcast rights.
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