From Punchbowl News:FORE! Congress digs in on PGA, LIV mergerThe most controversial merger in sports history will get its day on Capitol Hill next week, when top officials from the PGA Tour will testify in front of a Senate committee about its union with the Saudi-backed LIV Tour.Ron Price, the chief operating officer of the PGA Tour, and Jimmy Dunne, the top powerbroker in professional golf, will testify in front of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, chaired by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), on July 11. The hearing is entitled “The PGA-LIV Deal: Implications for the Future of Golf and Saudi Arabia’s Influence in the United States.”Price has been with the PGA since 1994. Dunne is a longtime force in professional golf. He’s the vice chairman of investment bank Piper Sandler and a member at some of the nation’s most prestigious golf clubs, including Seminole Country Club in Florida, Pine Valley in New Jersey and Augusta National, the home of the Masters.Greg Norman, the former professional golfer who has served as the face of the LIV Tour, and Yasir al-Rumayyan, the head of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, declined to testify on July 11.The politics here are fascinating. The PGA Tour railed against LIV for months – urging senators and members of the House to join in the criticism – and eventually merged with the Saudi-backed tour in a reversal that shocked the sports world and many players. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed pause about the Saudis’ involvement in the PGA Tour, especially given its sometimes adversarial relationship with the United States.U.S. athletic organizations have so far balked at foreign ownership, and now, according to critics, the Saudis will have outsized sway over the world’s premier golf tour.But the PGA leadership has argued that Saudi investment will make the tour stronger and consolidate the fractured professional golf world.What to watch: It will be up to Dunne and Price to explain how the Saudis will be involved in the day-to-day management of the PGA Tour. Furthermore, we may get more information on how the LIV Tour and PGA Tour will merge – which, as of now, is akin to a state secret.[/size]The downtown angle: The PGA Tour has DLA Piper and former Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) – himself an avid golfer and member of the exclusive Burning Tree Country Club in Maryland – on retainer. Jeff Miller, a close ally of Speaker Kevin McCarthy, also lobbies for the PGA Tour. The Tour spent $190,000 lobbying in the first quarter of 2023 – $110,000 with Miller Strategies and $80,000 with DLA Piper.[/size]– Jake Sherman[/font]