N.J. Sen. introduces bill that would make state's NIL law active on July 1

N.J. state Sen. Joseph Lagana (D) on Thursday introduced a new bill that "moves up" the state's NIL law's "start date to July 1," according to Steve Politi of the Newark STAR-LEDGER. Lagana said, “Since we passed the New Jersey Fair Play Act with a delayed implementation date, the NCAA has blown through self-imposed deadlines to address these concerns and several other states have joined this fight. We simply can’t wait, our student athletes are demanding fairness, they deserve it and we should act.” Politi writes the "smart, proactive and long overdue" New Jersey Fair Play Act, passed in '20, forbids state universities from "preventing athletes from earning compensation" from their NIL rights. But the "well-intentioned law doesn’t help anyone until 2025." N.J. legislators picked '25 as the start date due to "simple politics," as it "wasn’t going to pass without the long runway." The law's sponsors last September decided that a "delayed law was better than no law at all" (Newark STAR-LEDGER, 6/11).