{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/news-sanders-casar-introduce-legislation-to-prevent-owners-from-moving-teams-without-giving-locals-chance-to-buy/", "NEWS: Sanders, Casar Introduce Legislation to Prevent Owners from Moving Teams Without Giving Locals Chance to Buy", "2026-03-26", "2026", "2026-03", "Independent", "Senate", "VT", "Bernard Sanders", "S000033", "www.sanders.senate.gov", "sanders", "https://www.sanders.senate.gov/media/press-releases/", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, March 26 \u2013 Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) today introduced the Home Team Act, legislation to require owners of professional sports teams to give local communities the chance to buy teams before relocating them.\n\nJoining Sanders and Casar as cosponsors of this legislation are Sens. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), and five members of the House of Representatives.\n\n\u201cThe American people are sick and tired of billionaires threatening to move the sports teams they own to different states unless they get hundreds of millions in corporate welfare to build new stadiums,\u201d Sanders said. \u201cIn my view, professional sports teams should be owned and controlled by the fans who love them, not by the multibillionaire oligarchs who are getting even richer by charging outrageous prices and getting taxpayers to pick up their extravagant costs. You shouldn\u2019t have to be wealthy to take your family to a football game. You shouldn\u2019t have to fear that a multibillionaire will move your favorite team to a different city if taxpayers refuse to subsidize it. The Home Team Act is a very modest piece of legislation that begins to address this problem. I am proud to support it.\u201d\n\n\u201cSports in America should be about more than just making billionaire owners even richer,\u201d Casar said. \u201cFar too many Americans know the pain of losing a team, and far too many communities have had to fork over billions in subsidies just to keep an already profitable team home. Our bill is about creating a level playing field so leagues work for fans and taxpayers, not just owners.\u201d\n\nThe bill would protect fans from losing teams and protect taxpayers from being extorted for huge subsidies by the threat of relocation. It:\n\nRequires sports franchise owners to provide notice a year before moving the team to a new community, defined by crossing state lines or moving to a new Metropolitan Statistical Area;\n\nDuring that year, it gives communities the chance to purchase the team at a fair price, including through the sort of successful community ownership model used by the Green Bay Packers. Teams could also be purchased by a government entity, a nonprofit or public partnership, or a private person, group, or company;\n\nEnforces a penalty for franchise owners who do not comply and provides a right of action for state and local governments.\n\nThe bill would not require anyone to purchase a team and it would not prevent teams from moving if there is not a buyer able to meet a fair and reasonable price, as assessed by a team of appraisers.\n\nTeam relocation has plagued communities across America for decades, from the Brooklyn Dodgers moving in 1958 to recent moves such as the Oakland Athletics departing for Las Vegas. In other instances, the threat of relocation forces cities or states to offer billions of dollars in subsidies to teams already worth billions of dollars. Currently, the Chicago Bears are threatening to leave the city after more than 100 years in response to the state of Indiana offering massive subsidies. The bill would prevent the Bears from being moved across state lines without being offered for sale.\n\nRead the bill text here.", 1, "2026-04-04T05:28:40Z", "2026-04-04T05:30:10Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/news-sanders-casar-introduce-legislation-to-prevent-owners-from-moving-teams-without-giving-locals-chance-to-buy/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 2.140881959348917, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}