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As U.S. politicians on both sides of the aisle have taken aim at the growing cost and complexity for Americans to watch their favorite sports teams on streaming services, three of the industry’s biggest streamers —
Netflix, Amazon and YouTube — have formed a new Washington, D.C.-based lobbying group to push back.
The Streaming Access and Choice Alliance (SACA), which was announced Monday, will “promote high-quality and high-value entertainment experiences for consumers.” The group was founded by Amazon, Netflix and YouTube and is led by TechNet, a trade group that represents major technology companies.
SACA “advocates for technology-neutral policies that encourage innovation in entertainment — enabling streaming services to invest in a wide range of programming, including live sports,” the alliance said in a statement. On its newly launched website, the group says, “Streaming plays a central role in bringing sports programming to wider, more diverse audiences across the country. Streaming provides multi-game viewing options, analytics-focused feeds, creator-hosted companion shows, and more — all contributing to a high-quality and personalized experience.”
According to SACA’s founders, the volume of sports content on major global subscription streaming services has increased by 52% since January 2024.
“Americans want more content choices and flexibility in how and where they watch their favorite programming, including sports and other live events,” Mike Ward, senior VP of federal policy and government relations at TechNet, said in a statement. “Streaming and digital entertainment companies offer audiences better features and value for their money. The industry and its customers deserve a dedicated voice in Washington, D.C., advocating for policies that enable innovation and address the needs of today’s consumers.”
The formation of the Streaming Access and Choice Alliance by Netflix, Amazon and YouTube comes as the migration of sports from broadcast TV to streaming platforms has become a hot-button political issue.
Earlier this year, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) introduced a new bill designed to “to stop professional sports leagues from blacking out games for fans, end the complicated web of streaming services and cut costs for viewers across the country.” The bill would require leagues to provide local fans with access to all of their teams’ games in one single location (either on TV or streaming) for free. According to Baldwin’s calculations, Wisconsin sports fans currently would need to pay more than $1,500 per year to be able to watch all of the Packers, Brewers and Bucks games across multiple services.
In June, the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee held a hearing focused on the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, which grants professional sports leagues like the NFL a limited exemption from federal antitrust laws to collectively sell their media rights, and released a report claiming the law was “a special-interest antitrust exemption gone awry.”
The new Streaming Access and Choice Alliance is separate from the Streaming Innovation Alliance, which launched in 2023, that advocates “for federal and state policies that build on the strong, competitive and pro-consumer market for streaming video.” Founding members of the Streaming Innovation Alliance include Netflix, Disney, Paramount, Warner Bros. Discovery, NBCUniversal’s Peacock, the Motion Picture Association and TelevisaUnivision.
