Republican senators Ted Cruz (TX), Josh Hawley (MO), and Mike Lee (UT) will introduce legislation that would strip Major League Baseball (MLB) of its antitrust exemptions.

The move comes following Commissioner Rob Manfred’s decision to pull the All-Star Game and the MLB Draft out of Georgia due to a voting law that has been characterized as voting restrictions.

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Critics have claimed the law restricts access to voting, while Governor Brian Kemp (R) insists it expands access to voting.

Cruz blasted MLB for playing politics in moving the All-Star game.

“That decision was harmful. It’s going to hurt baseball. But it also underscores that there’s no reason Major League Baseball should enjoy special subsidies — corporate welfare that no one else gets,” he said.

RELATED: Marco Rubio Dares MLB Commissioner To Give Up Augusta National Golf Club Membership In Georgia

Stripping MLB Of Their Antitrust Exemption

USA Today calls the MLB antitrust exemption the league’s “century-old golden goose.”

They describe it as “a gift from Congress and the Supreme Court that allows it to operate, in essence, as a monopoly.”

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The exemption also allows MLB to restrict where a team can relocate and gives them an incredibly tight grip on minor league baseball, allowing them to control wages and where teams are located.

The league was heavily criticized for gutting the minor league system this year, eliminating 43 teams.

Perhaps their ‘woke’ politics will end up taking out MLB’s unfettered power.

“The fact that Major League Baseball would get together and try to punish a state because the elected representatives of that state and the elected governor of that state settled on a law to preserve election integrity is unbelievable,” Hawley railed at a press conference.

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Hawley Office Weighs In

Abigail Marone, Press Secretary for Hawley, said MLB “shouldn’t get a special government handout” for trying to influence the political process.

Marone also blasted NBC News for an article that claimed progressives are the ones interested in “protecting voting rights.”

Last week, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) challenged Manfred to keep his woke politics consistent, daring him to give up his membership to Augusta National Golf Club in the midst of the controversy.

Manfred has yet to respond to the challenge.

And while the Commissioner claims interest in protecting minorities with a political gambit to move the All-Star game from Atlanta to predominantly white Denver, Colorado, its actual minorities who are being hurt by the pettiness.

Removing the event from Atlanta is having a devastating economic impact on the state of Georgia, from costing an estimated $100 million in revenue to disproportionately impacting Black-owned businesses.

Perhaps the only way to get MLB to take notice is by hurting them in the wallet as well.

 

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This piece originally appeared in ThePoliticalInsider.com and is used by permission.

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