‘The cons outweigh the pros’: Nico Ali Walsh reacts to Senate hearing on Ali Act

(L-R) Timothy Shipman, President of the Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports, US professional boxer Nico Ali Walsh and Nick Khan, President of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) testify during a Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation hearing to "examine federal boxing laws" on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on April 22, 2026. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP via Getty Images) | AFP via Getty Images Golden Boy promoter Oscar De La Hoya wasn’t the only one speaking out against those who would do away with the Ali Act during yesterday’s Senate hearing , with boxer Nico Ali Walsh also attending the proceedings to share his perspective on protecting fighters. With certain interested parties looking to do away with the Ali Act, the grandson of the man the law was named after shared some of these thoughts.

“I feel like the hearing went perfectly for our side. Oscar De La Hoya, he spoke very effectively I felt on our side of things, and I felt I did a good job as well. Just doing what we can to prevent boxing from going the direction that those guys want it to,” Ali Walsh said.

“It’s a rug pull situation. They come with empty promises of fixing health and safety, adding health and safety standards to boxing that no one can disagree with. You’ll never see me, you’ll never see Oscar or anyone who’s on the side of keeping or maintaining the original Ali Act — you’ll never see us saying no, we don’t want any new health and safety policies being added.

So they added those promises but on the backend of things they’re adding so much that’ll disrupt the sport and it’ll monopolize the sport to one system…The cons outweigh the pros tremendously. “Some of the safety things, some of the health things they want to add, more testing, more medical staff on standby at the ring — those kind of things, that’s great. There’s no problem with that.