The TICKET Act has been left in limbo after an intervention from Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Both men demanded multiple rounds of spending cuts last week.

Despite gaining significant traction and passing in the House of Representatives earlier this year, the TICKET Act has been gutted. Now the bill is left in limbo after an intervention from President-elect Donald Trump and his advisors, including Elon Musk.

The bill, which was designed to increase ticket pricing transparency, also aims to ban speculative ticketing in the United States. It passed in the House of Representatives earlier this year and needed to pass through the Senate in order to be written into law.

Although it carried bipartisan support, the bill’s progress was hindered after it arrived in the Senate last week. That’s when Trump and his advisors (including Musk) demanded another wave of spending cuts.

The following day (December 19), a revised spending bill was presented to the Senate, but it excluded the TICKET Act. That bill was rejected nonetheless, with 38 Republicans joining Democrats in opposing it. Another further revised spending bill was passed on December 20, but it also failed to include the TICKET Act.

The TICKET Act’s future is now uncertain. It will probably remain in limbo for the foreseeable future as Congress moves on to address other matters. The bill was designed to mandate all ticket vendors to display all-in pricing at the point of sale and ban them from selling “speculative tickets” — those they did not have in hand. Further, it would have forced the FTC to enforce a rule preventing scalpers from using bots to secure tickets.

In spite of its bipartisan support, the TICKET Act was not universally supported. Stephen Parker, Executive Director of the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), said, “Congressional leaders should be commended for seeking to fix ticketing. While their efforts were well-meaning, the TICKET Act would have taken us backwards. Consumers deserve a real ban on speculative ticketing, not one with a loophole that renders it ineffective.”

“Federal ticketing policy cannot pass without the support of the artists, stages, and fans that make up the heart of the live music ecosystem,” he continued. “Predatory resellers and platforms are not even part of live performance and prey on our sector to bloat their profits. Unlike this week, we hope that the next Congress will listen to the creators, small businesses, and real consumers — without whom, there would be no shows to sell tickets to.”

The news comes just a few days after the FTC announced a separate ban on “junk fees” on concert tickets in the United States. Platforms selling tickets must display all mandatory fees upfront during the purchasing process, rather than them appearing at checkout.

Meanwhile, Kid Rock recently met with Trump’s Attorney General pick Pam Bondi last week. During that meeting he promised to “open a can of whoop ass” on the current state of the concert ticket industry.

But the issue isn’t exclusive to the United States. The UK launched an investigation earlier this year into the use of “dynamic pricing”. That comes after Ticketmaster’s surge pricing saw the highly coveted tickets for the Oasis reunion tour skyrocket.