Pennsylvania governor Tom Corbett's antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA was thrown out of federal court Thursday morning, according to an Associated Press report. As SB Nation's Robert Wheel noted months ago, the suit was probably dead on arrival because the state of Pennsylvania did not have standing under federal law. U.S. Middle District Court Judge Yvette Kane's decision to toss it out confirms as much.
Corbett filed the suit in January, and he had hoped to get the sanctions levied against Penn State's football program removed. He argued that the "citizens and businesses of Pennsylvania have been harmed" and that the NCAA failed to follow its own bylaws.
But the suit may have been a stunt to earn political points rather than an honest attempt to defend Penn State's football program and erase the penalties leveled against it. Corbett is up for re-election in 2014, and given the flimsy nature of this lawsuit, it may simply have been a superficial gesture aimed at broadening his political base. Wheel outlined this possible ulterior motive in his dismantling of the suit in January.
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