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An investigation into a sprawling betting scheme to rig NCAA and Chinese Basketball Association games ensnared 26 people, including more than a dozen college basketball players who tried to fix games as recently as last season, federal prosecutors said Thursday. The scheme generally revolved around fixers recruiting players with the promise of a big payment in exchange for purposefully underperforming during a game, prosecutors said. The fixers would then place big bets against the players teams in those games, defrauding sportsbooks and other bettors, authorities said. Calling it an international criminal conspiracy, U.S. Attorney David Metcalf told reporters in Philadelphia that this case represents a significant corruption of the integrity of sports. The indictment suggests that many others including unnamed players had a role in the scheme but werent charged, and Metcalf said the investigation was continuing. The varying charges against the 26 defendants, filed in federal court in Philadelphia, include bribery, wire fraud, and conspiracy. Concerns about gambling and college sports have grown since 2018, when the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a federal ban on the practice, leading some states to legalize it to varying degrees. According to the indictment unsealed Thursday, fixers started with two games in the Chinese Basketball Association in 2023 and, successful there, moved on to rigging NCAA games as recently as January 2025. The fixers scheme grew to involve more than 39 players on more than 17 different NCAA Division I mens basketball teams, who then rigged and attempted to rig more than 29 games, prosecutors said. They wagered millions of dollars, generating substantial proceeds for themselves, and paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to players in bribes, prosecutors said, with payments to players typically ranging from $10,000 to $30,000 per game. Prosecutors named more than 40 schools that were involved in games that were targeted by the scheme. Rigged games included those played by teams in major conferences, such as Big East and Atlantic 10, prosecutors said. Some were games against nationally ranked programs while some were playoff games, including the first round of the Horizon League championship and the second round of the Southland Conference championship. Some of the allegedly targeted teams were Tulane University, Buffalo State University, DePaul University, Robert Morris University, University of Southern Mississippi, Abilene Christian University, Eastern Michigan State University and the University of New Orleans. Players often recruited teammates to cooperate by playing badly, sitting out or keeping the ball away from players who werent in on the scheme to prevent them from scoring. Sometimes the attempted fix failed, meaning the fixers lost their bets. To entice players, fixers would text photos of stacks of cash. In one case, a fixer encouraged a player to recruit a St. Louis University teammate by texting him one such photo: send that to him if he bite he bite if he dont so be it lol, the indictment said. Four of the players charged Simeon Cottle, Carlos Hart, Oumar Koureissi and Camian Shell played for their current teams in the last few days, although the allegations against them do not involve this season, but the 2023-24 season. Of the defendants, 15 played basketball for Division I NCAA schools during 2024-25 season, prosecutors say. Five others last played in the NCAA in the 2023-24 season while another, former NBA player Antonio Blakeney, played in the Chinese Basketball Association in the 2022-23 season. The remaining five defendants were described as fixers who recruited players and placed bets. They include two men who prosecutors say worked in the training and development of basketball players. Another was a trainer and former coach, one was a former NCAA player and two were described as gamblers, influencers and sports handicappers. One fixer reassured another by texting him there were no guarantees in this world but death taxes and Chinese basketball, court papers said. At the end of the Chinese Basketball Association’s 2022-23 season, fixers put nearly $200,000 in bribe payments and shared winnings from rigged games into Blakeney’s storage locker in Florida, authorities said. In many instances, the defendants wagers on the rigged games were successful. The sportsbooks would not have paid out those wagers had they known that the defendants fixed those games, the indictment said. One betting scandal after another has rocked the sports world, where gambling revenue topped $11 billion for the first three-quarters of last year, according to the American Gaming Association. Thats up more than 13% from the prior year, the group said. The NCAA does not allow athletes or staff to bet on college games, but it briefly allowed student-athletes to bet on professional sports last year before rescinding that decision in November. The indictment follows a series of NCAA investigations that led to at least 10 players receiving lifetime bans this year for bets that sometimes involved their own teams and their own performances. And the NCAA has said that at least 30 players have been investigated over gambling allegations. More than 30 people were also charged in last years sprawling federal takedown of illegal gambling operations linked to professional basketball. Marc Levy and Tassanee Vejpongsa, Associated Press Associated Press writer Maryclaire Dale contributed.
Category:
E-Commerce
President Donald Trump on Thursday announced the outlines of a health care plan he wants Congress to take up as Republicans have faced increasing pressure to address rising health costs after lawmakers let subsidies expire. The cornerstone is his proposal to send money directly to Americans for health savings accounts so they can handle insurance and health costs as they see fit. Democrats have rejected the idea as a paltry substitute for the tax credits that had helped lower monthly premiums for many people. The government is going to pay the money directly to you, Trump said in a taped video the White House released to announce the plan. It goes to you and then you take the money and buy your own health care. Trump’s plan also focuses on lowering drug prices and requiring insurers to be more upfront with the public about costs, revenues, rejected claims and wait times for care. Trump has long been dogged by his lack of a comprehensive health care plan as he and Republicans have sought to unwind former President Barack Obamas signature legislation, the Affordable Care Act. Trump was thwarted during his first term in trying to repeal and replace the law. When he ran for president in 2024, Trump said he had only concepts of a plan to address health care. His new proposal, short on many specifics, appeared to be the concepts of a plan. Dr. Mehmet Oz, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, described it to reporters on a telephone briefing as a framework that we believe will help Congress create legislation. It was not immediately clear if any lawmakers in Congress were working to introduce the Republican presidents plan. A White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly and described some details on condition of anonymity said the administration had been discussing the proposal with allies in Congress, but was unable to name any lawmakers who were working to address the plan. Few specifics on health savings accounts The White House did not offer any details about how much money it envisioned being sent to consumers to shop for insurance, or whether the money would be available to all Obamacare enrollees or just those with lower-tier bronze and catastrophic plans. The idea mirrors one floated among Republican senators last year. Democrats largely rejected it, saying the accounts would not be enough to cover costs for most consumers. Currently, such accounts are used disproportionately by the wealthiest Americans, who have more income to fund them and a bigger incentive to lower their tax rate. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked at her briefing Thursday whether the president could guarantee that under his plan, people would be able to cover their health costs. She did not directly answer, but said, If this plan is put in place, every single American who has health care in the United States will see lower costs as a result. Enhanced tax credits that helped reduce the cost of insurance for the vast majority of Affordable Care Act enrollees expired at the end of 2025 even though Democrats had forced a 43-day government shutdown over the issue. Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, has been leading a bipartisan group of 12 senators trying to devise a compromise that would extend those subsidies for two years while adding new limits on who can receive them. That proposal would create the option, in the second year, of a health savings account that Trump and Republicans prefer. The White House official denied that Trump was closing the door completely on those bipartisan negotiations, and said the White House preferred to send money directly to consumers. Plan follows massive cuts to health programs Trumps plan comes months after the Republicans big tax and spending bill last year cut more than $1 trillion over a decade in federal health care and food assistance, largely by imposing work requirements on those receiving aid and shifting certain federal costs to the states. Democrats have blasted those cuts as devastating for vulnerable people who rely on programs such as Medicaid for their health care. The GOP bill included an infusion of $50 billion over five years for rural health programs, an amount experts have said is inadequate to fill the gap in funding. The White House said Trump’s new proposal will seek to bring down premiums by fully funding cost-sharing reductions, or CSRs, a type of financial help that insurers give to low-income ACA enrollees on silver-level, or mid-tier plans. From 2014 until 2017, the federal government reimbursed insurance companies for CSRs. In 2017, the first Trump administration stopped making those payments. To make up for the lost money, insurance companies raised premiums for silver-level plans. That ended up increasing the financial assistance many enrollees got to help them pay for premiums. As a result, health analysts say that while restoring money for CSRs would likely bring down silver-level premiums, as Trump says, it could have the unwelcome ripple effect of increasing many peoples net premiums on bronze and gold plans. Lowering drug prices is a priority Oz said Trump’s plans also seeks to have certain medications made available over the counter instead of by prescription if they are deemed safe enough. He mentioned higher-dose nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and peptic ulcer drugs as two examples. It was unclear whether the White House is asking Congress to take steps to make more prescription drugs available over the counter. For decades, the Food and Drug Administration has had the ability to do that. The heartburn drug Prilosec, as well as numerous allergy medications, are among those the FDA has approved for over-the-counter sales. The FDA only approves such changes if studies show patients can safely take the drug after reading the package labeling. Companies must apply for the switch. The White House said Trumps plan would also codify his efforts to lower drug prices by tying prices to the lowest price paid by other countries. Trump has already struck deals with a number of drugmakers to get them to lower the prices. As part of that, the drugmakers have agreed to sell pharmacy-ready medicines directly to consumers who can shop online at the White House’s website for selling drugs directly to consumers, TrumpRx.gov. TrumpRx did not yet have any drugs listed on Thursday. Oz said drugs will be available on the website at the end of the month. Michelle L. Price and li Swenson, Associated Press AP Health Writer Matthew Perrone contributed to this report.
Category:
E-Commerce
A federal judge on Thursday cleared the way for a New York offshore wind project to resume construction, a victory for the developer who said a Trump administration order to pause it would likely kill the project in a matter of days. District Judge Carl J. Nichols, an appointee of President Donald Trump, ruled construction on the Empire Wind project could go forward while he considers the merits of the governments order to suspend the project. He faulted the government for not responding to key points in Empire Winds court filings, including the contention that the administration violated proper procedure. Norwegian company Equinor owns Empire Wind. Spokesperson David Schoetz said they welcome the court’s decision and will continue to work in collaboration with authorities. Its the second developer to prevail in court against the administration this week. The Trump administration froze five big offshore wind projects on the East Coast days before Christmas, citing national security concerns. Trump has targeted offshore wind from his first days back in the White House, most recently calling wind farms losers that lose money, destroy the landscape and kill birds. Developers and states sued seeking to block the order. Large, ocean-based wind farms are the linchpin of plans to shift to renewable energy in East Coast states that have limited land for onshore wind turbines or solar arrays. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul applauded the court decision, telling reporters the projects had been stopped under the bogus pretense of national security. When I heard this I said one thing: Im the governor of New York, if there is a national security threat off the coast of New York, you need to tell me what it is. I want a briefing right now. Well, lo and behold, they had no answer, she said. On Monday, a judge ruled that the Danish energy company Orsted could resume its project to serve Rhode Island and Connecticut. Senior Judge Royce Lamberth said the government did not sufficiently explain the need for a complete stop to construction. That wind farm, called Revolution Wind, is nearly complete. Its expected to meet roughly 20% of the electricity needs in Rhode Island, the smallest state, and about 5% of Connecticuts electricity needs. Orsted is also suing over the pause of its Sunrise Wind project for New York, with a hearing still to be set. Dominion Energy Virginia, which is developing Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, plans to ask a judge Friday to block the administrations order so it can resume construction, too. Trump has also dismissed offshore wind developments as ugly, but the Empire project is about 14 miles (22.5 kilometers) offshore and the Sunrise project is about 30 miles (48 kilometers) offshore. The fifth paused project is Vineyard Wind, under construction in Massachusetts. Vineyard Wind LLC, a joint venture between Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, joined the rest of the developers in challenging the administration on Thursday. They filed a complaint in District Court in Boston. Robin Shaffer, president of Protect Our Coast New Jersey, said the administration was right to stop construction on national security grounds. He urged officials to immediately appeal the adverse rulings and seek to halt all work pending appellate review. Opponents of offshore wind projects are particularly vocal and well-organized in New Jersey. Empire Wind is 60% complete and designed to power more than 500,000 homes. Equinor said the project was in jeopardy due to the limited availability of specialized vessels, as well as heavy financial losses. During a hearing Wednesday, Judge Nichols said the governments main security concern seemed to be over operation of the wind turbines, not construction, although the government pushed back on that contention. In presenting the governments case, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, Jr. was skeptical of the perfect storm of horrible events that Empire Wind said would derail their entire project if construction didnt resume. He disagreed with the contention that the governments main concern was over operation. I dont see how you can make this distinction, Woodward said. He likened it to a nuclear project being built that presented a national security risk. The government would oppose it being built, and it turning on. Molly Morris, Equinors senior vice president overseeing Empire Wind, said in an interview that the company wants to build this project and deliver a major, essential new source of power for New York. ___ The Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find APs standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. Michael Phillis and Jennifer McDermott, Associated Press Associated Press writer Anthony Izaguirre contributed to this report.
Category:
E-Commerce
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