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Alexander Statement on NLRB Decision in Northwestern Football Unionization Case


WASHINGTON, March 26 – U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the senior Republican on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, released the following statement on the ruling by a regional director of the National Labor Relations Board that Northwestern University football players are employees eligible to form a union:

“Imagine a university’s basketball players striking before a Sweet Sixteen game demanding shorter practices, bigger dorm rooms, better food, and no classes before 11 a.m. This is an absurd decision that will destroy intercollegiate athletics as we know it.”

Alexander is a former president of the University of Tennessee and was U.S. secretary of education under George H.W. Bush 

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