NewsJanuary 28, 2026

“Too many suits lining their pockets off talent they never had and fans they mislead;” Kid Rock, Industry Executives Testify at Senate Hearing

As the Senate Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Technology, and Data Privacy gaveled in Jan. 28 for its ticketing…

As the Senate Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Technology, and Data Privacy gaveled in Jan. 28 for its ticketing hearing — “Fees Rolled on All Summer Long: Examining the Live Entertainment Industry” — the most combustible witness didn’t come armed with a narrow reform proposal or a technical brief on bots. He came to light the match.

“Too many suits lining their pockets off talent they never had and fans they mislead,” entertainer Kid Rock (AKA Robert Ritchie) said in his opening remarks, framing the live entertainment business as an ecosystem built to skim value from artists and the public alike. He argued the industry’s defining consolidation — the Live Nation–Ticketmaster merger — wasn’t a good-faith bet that went sideways, but something far more deliberate: “This wasn’t an experiment—it was a monopoly dressed up as innovation.”

That posture was an early signal of what the hearing would ultimately reveal: ticketing’s biggest fights are rarely about whether fans are being harmed. They’re about who gets to define the culprit, and what reforms shift control inside a market where incentives often collide with consumer outcomes — the same dynamic a National Consumers League letter urged senators not to let the conversation collapse into on the eve of the hearing.

FURTHER READING: Consumer Advocate Urges Senators to Look Beyond ‘Bots and Scalpers’ Ahead of Senate Hearing on Ticketing

TicketNews has embedded the full hearing video below.

Kid Rock: “burn it down” — scalpers, yes, but also the insider economy

Kid Rock’s submitted testimony was less a policy memo than an indictment. He attacked scalpers and bots, but repeatedly widened his target to include what he described as industry insiders and intermediaries who “skim” from the business — executives and dealmakers who, in his telling, extract money at each step while fans absorb ever-higher costs.

His framing positioned Live Nation and Ticketmaster not as necessary infrastructure, but as the central gravity that has warped the system. He called on Congress to use subpoena power to pry open contracts and arrangements behind the scenes, arguing lawmakers would find the real mechanics of how money is routed, who benefits, and why the market keeps delivering the same consumer outcomes.

He also advocated hard restrictions on the resale economy — including resale caps he has previously argued should be around 10% above face value — and emphasized punitive enforcement as the only language the ecosystem responds to.

Live Nation/Ticketmaster: bots as the central threat — and a warning shot at the FTC

Live Nation’s witness Dan Wall, the company’s EVP of Corporate and Regulatory Affairs, followed with a more structured narrative: ticketing, he argued, is now a large-scale “arms race” against sophisticated bot operators and brokers using networks of tools designed to evade purchase limits and security controls. It is a well-worn path for both Wall and the entertainment giant, which have regularly sought to shift blame for what many believe to be consequences of its own alleged monopoly in the entertainment space from itself to resale operators.

Wall highlighted Ticketmaster’s internal bot-blocking metrics as proof of scale, saying the company blocks billions of attempted attacks monthly — including 6.8 billion per month in 2024 — and claimed 51 billion bot “attacks” were blocked in Q4 2025 alone.

But the most important part of Wall’s testimony, politically, was his attempt to redirect the committee’s focus away from primary-market incentives and toward the secondary ecosystem — while also taking direct aim at federal enforcement that has put Ticketmaster itself under scrutiny.

Wall disputed the legal theory underpinning the Federal Trade Commission’s BOTS Act case against Ticketmaster, arguing it represents an “expansionist” interpretation that effectively treats exceeding posted ticket limits as inherently unlawful. In his telling, the BOTS Act is triggered by circumvention of “technological controls or measures,” not merely by buying more tickets than a policy allows.

Wall also urged Congress toward a federal framework that would expand rights-holder control over ticket transfer and resale rules, strengthen anti-bot enforcement, and tighten restrictions around speculative and deceptive listings. Critics argue that approach can function as consumer protection in some cases, but can also concentrate power in the hands of dominant primary platforms — particularly when transfer restrictions funnel transactions into controlled resale channels.

Ticket Policy Forum: don’t let the hearing become “blame resale” — focus on competition and enforceable protections

Ticket Policy Forum Executive Director Brian Berry’s testimony was designed as a counterbalance to that script. Where Live Nation and the venue-side perspective centered resale as the core harm engine, Berry argued secondary marketplaces are routinely cast as the easiest villain because resale prices are visible to consumers at moments of anger — even though many of the market’s most structural drivers originate upstream.

Berry urged senators to prioritize reforms that apply consistently across the ecosystem — particularly transparency rules and baseline consumer protections — without shrinking one of the only remaining competitive lanes in a market defined by consolidation.

He highlighted the bipartisan TICKET Act as a compromise lane, pointing to provisions aimed at all-in pricing, deceptive marketing, speculative ticketing rules, stronger expectations around refunds, and a more enforceable disclosure environment.

At the same time, Berry rejected resale price caps and other restrictions that would narrow lawful secondary supply. In a market where primary sellers can still route tickets into premium channels or use dynamic pricing, Berry argued, restricting resale pricing can amount to a one-sided intervention that doesn’t touch the practices that inflate costs at the source.

Independent venues / NIVA: a crackdown agenda aimed at speculative listings and “ghost tickets”

Rounding out the opening statements, David Weingarden — representing the Colorado Independent Venue Association, a National Independent Venue Association chapter — pressed a case that resale is not merely a side effect of the system, but a primary driver of consumer harm that venues are forced to absorb operationally and reputationally.

Weingarden focused on speculative listings and what he described as “ghost ticket” behavior — listings posted before the seller possesses tickets, including concierge-style models in which sellers take payment and attempt to source later if profitable. He described scenarios venues say they encounter repeatedly: third-party sites marketing “sold out” or scarcity signals while primary inventory remains available, listing specific seats for general admission events, and selling tickets for free shows.

His policy wish list leaned heavily toward restriction: banning resale before public on-sales, banning speculative ticketing “with zero loopholes,” cracking down on deceptive URLs and marketing, strengthening bot laws, and supporting antitrust action against Live Nation/Ticketmaster. He also argued for resale caps — a face-value-plus framework — a position resale advocates say would reduce legitimate supply and push activity into less transparent channels.

The hearing in full: beyond written testimony, senators pressed both sides

While the four witnesses set the stage for familiar fault lines — bots and scalpers, resale restrictions versus competition, and the unresolved question of how much market structure drives the consumer experience — the live hearing expanded beyond prepared remarks. Senators pressed witnesses from multiple angles, taking aim at claims made by both primary and secondary interests, and repeatedly circling back to the consumer reality that shows up at checkout: high fees, opaque pricing, limited meaningful choice, and a buying process many fans describe as stacked against them.

TicketNews will continue tracking fallout from the hearing, including any additional materials submitted for the record, follow-on legislative movement around proposals like the TICKET Act and bot enforcement measures, and how federal antitrust and consumer protection cases intersect with the narratives witnesses attempted to advance.