Sen. Tommy Tuberville slams NIL deals, talks health care, immigration at chamber speech

U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville on Wednesday slammed name, image and likeness deals, saying they are negatively impacting college athletics.

"NIL is ruining college athletics," he said, adding that they are part of the reason Nick Saban chose to retire as head football coach at the University of Alabama. "When you can't control your own team, it's hard to do the job."

Tuberville, R-Alabama, is a former Auburn football coach and spoke at the Montgomery Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday morning as part of the Chamber's Washington Brief series.

NIL is one of the biggest issues facing college athletics in recent years. For instance, Tennessee and Virginia are suing the NCAA over its rules involving NIL benefits for athletes.

The suit, which was filed in federal court in Tennessee on Jan. 31, argues the NCAA violated federal antitrust laws by putting a “shifting and opaque series of rules and guidelines” around athletes’ NIL benefits.

It contends that recruits and transfers should be allowed to negotiate and sign NIL contracts before enrolling into a university, which is currently against NCAA rules.In addition to athletics, Tuberville spoke about health care and immigration during his chamber speech.

"There's no country on the face of the planet that has better health care," Tuberville said. "One thing we don't have is a way to implement it."

Tuberville said that the country needs more nurses and other health care professionals, adding that the state is proud to hold onto its rural hospitals. He also said the issue of what people eat needs to be addressed.

He cited fast food, preservatives and food colorings are large differences in American vs. European life expectancies. "One's hurting the other," he said, "I don't think we do a very good job of, of looking at what we put in our bodies."

As a member of the agriculture committee, Tuberville said small farmers "need the opportunity to be able to grow their crops," saying this is an issue in multiple states.

"We have Chairman permission she's not running for reelection, so she's not really interested in getting the Farm Bill, he said, "Hopefully we'll get it done next year."

Bringing up the current election year, Tuberville said COVID was a huge factor in the 2020 election, saying that there needs to be a return to using ballots in person.

"At the end of the day, we want to make sure that the people are heard," he said, saying he is "not real confident in any kind of machine or internet counting votes" and that it's a state issue that members of the state legislature "have got a lot of work to do" on the matter.

Meanwhile, on immigration and border control, Tuberville said the border is out biggest issue. He said that the country wants immigrants to come in but needs to be more selective about it.

"We need great people here to speak our language, are educated and take care of themselves," he said, "we can't be a country that just opens their doors." He added that doing so is "on the backs of the taxpayers" causing an increase in taxes when more immigrants are accepted into the country.

Reporter Adam Sparks in Knoxville, Tennessee, contributed to this report.

Victor Hagan is the Alabama Election Reporting Fellow for the USA TODAY Network. He can be reached at vhagan@gannett.com. To support his work, subscribe to Advertiser.

This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Sen. Tuberville says the border is the biggest issue