Attorney General William Tong will be making an announcement about the Connecticut Sun on Thursday morning.

The WNBA team’s future in Connecticut has come into question amid a bid from Boston to move the team there and efforts to keep the Sun here in the state.

In early August, the minority owner of the Boston Celtics offered to buy the team for $325 million, move the team to Boston and build a new practice facility.

Later in the month, reports surfaced that a Connecticut-based group made a similar offer to keep the team in the state, move them to Hartford and provide a new practice facility.

Then, last week, Connecticut lawmakers announced that they were looking at a bid to buy a minority stake in the team and keep it in Uncasville.

Gov. Ned Lamont’s latest attempt to keep the Connecticut Sun in the state involves using pension funds to buy a part of the team.

On Wednesday, Lamont and state treasurer Erick Russell said that Connecticut is seeing good returns on its investments, it’s paying down its pension debt and those investments greatly out-performed expectation, adding $5.9 billion in value to a pension fund that is now 60-percent funded.

That raises hopes that more money will be available in the budget for various needs.  

Lamont wants to use some of those funds to keep the Connecticut Sun in state and he’s proposed the state buying a minority share.

He didn’t go into details other than to say the state would be joined by other private investors.  

“They like the nature of the investment, they think it’s a really good long-term return,” Lamont said.   

Lamont did say the bid includes a 10-year guarantee that the team would stay and that Connecticut would be a senior investor, meaning the state would get priority when it comes to collecting any return.

Democratic leaders also like pursuing the idea.  

“I would certainly trust the governor and the treasurer to make sure that the state gets maximum benefit for its investment,” Sen. Martin Looney, D-president pro tem, said.  

But Republicans said this is not an appropriate use of pension funds. While the fund has doubled over the last decade, Connecticut still has one of the worst-funded systems of any state in the country.  

“While i think there should be an effort made to try to keep the team here, let’s not throw everything, and I feel like we’re at the casino right now throwing everything on seven,” State Rep. Vincent Candelora, R-minority leader, said.

The WNBA and its board of governors would need to approve any sale or relocation of a team in the league and the league has rejected bids from buyers who want to move the team to Hartford and to Boston.

U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal has written a letter to the WNBA, calling for them to stay out of the negotiations and said such interference could violate federal antitrust laws.

“Any further attempts by the WNBA to use its considerable governance and market power over the Connecticut Sun to limit or dictate negotiations with the state of Connecticut could be a unreasonable restraint of trade and interference with the market that would violate federal antitrust laws,” Blumenthal wrote. “As a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has jurisdiction over antitrust matters, I am closely monitoring the WNBA’s actions and will demand investigations and enforcement actions from the appropriate federal authorities if it takes any step to hinder or constrain Connecticut’s negotiations.”

You can find the full letter here.

The attorney general’s announcement is coming at 10 a.m. from the Office of the Attorney General in Hartford.

Tong will be joined by Connecticut Economic Development Commissioner Daniel O’Keefe.