Congress requests briefing from NBA commissioner Adam Silver on gambling scandal
By Issy Ronald, CNN
(CNN) — Members of Congress wrote to NBA commissioner Adam Silver on Friday, asking him to provide a briefing by October 31 relating to the gambling scandal that engulfed the league earlier this week.
Sent by a bipartisan group of six representatives on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the letter calls on Silver to further explain the NBA’s relationship with sports betting to “assist the Committee in its oversight.”
The committee’s intervention came the day after Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and former NBA journeyman Damon Jones were named among 34 people indicted in connection with two separate federal gambling investigations announced by the Eastern District of New York.
The letter lists five points for Silver to address, asking him to explain further details about the “alleged betting practices in connection with NBA players, coaches and officials,” as well as the actions the league intends to take to limit inside information being used for “illegal purposes.”
It also asked Silver to evaluate whether the league’s current code of conduct for players and coaches “effectively prohibits illegal activity,” and outline “whether and how the NBA is reevaluating the terms of its partnerships with sports betting companies.” The league has partnership deals with betting companies DraftKings and FanDuel.
As for more strictly policing sports betting, the committee asked Silver to identify any gaps in “existing regulations that allow illegal betting schemes to occur.”
For example, it referenced Silver’s appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” Tuesday in which he said, “I wish there was federal legislation rather than state by state,” and added that “we’ve asked some of our partners to pull back some of the prop bets.”
CNN has reached out to the NBA for comment.
Silver, in his first public comments on the scandal on Friday, said he had “a pit in his stomach” when he heard the news.
“My initial reaction was I was deeply disturbed,” he told broadcaster Amazon Prime Video during the Boston Celtics’ game against the New York Knicks. “There’s nothing more important to the league and its fans than the integrity of the competition… It was very upsetting.”
The allegations, the committee noted, “raise serious concerns about sports betting and the integrity of sport in the NBA, which harms fans and legal sports bettors,” prompting it to assume its oversight role.
Billups, the Portland head coach since 2021, is charged in an elaborate, mafia-linked scheme in which marks were lured to participate in rigged poker games in part with the opportunity to play alongside the NBA five-time All-Star as well as Jones.
Rozier, who was arrested in an Orlando hotel, was alleged to participate in a game-fixing scheme that included prop bets on his availability.
Jones, who retired from playing in 2012, is one of three people to be charged in both cases.
Jim Trusty, Rozier’s attorney, strongly disputed the accusations, saying prosecutors characterized Rozier as a subject of their investigation and not a target. An attorney for Billups denied the allegations. CNN has reached out to Jones’ representatives but has not heard back.
Despite focusing on the latest allegations, the letter also noted that “illegal sports betting based on non-public information in the NBA is not a new problem,” citing the cases of former referee Tim Donaghy in 2007 and Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter in 2024.
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CNN’s Dana O’Neil and Alaa Elassar contributed reporting.
