The American Gaming Association, in conjunction with industry partners and allies in Washington, urged Congress to take a look at the 25 year-old federal ban on sports betting Wednesday morning.
At a Capitol Hill briefing hosted by Third Way, a centrist think tank, the group and several coalitional allies presented their case to policymakers and congressional staffers as to why the the legislative body should revisit the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, which effectively bans sports betting outside of Nevada.
“The time for this to happen is now. There is momentum for legalized sports betting unlike there has ever been in the past,” said Sara Slane, AGA’s senior vice president of public affairs, emphasizing that because there will likely be a change in some form to the national sports betting framework, legislators and policy makers would be wise to get smart quickly.
“We do anticipate there will be some sort of change to federal law, and the sooner we that can get in front of this and make sure that all the stakeholders’ concerns and issues are addressed, the better off we’ll be [in the long run],” she said.
Gabe Horowitz, vice president of economic policy at Third Way, moderated the discussion, explaining that the ongoing efforts to change PASPA, a movement in statehouses around the country to look into sports betting, and the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to take up the issue, are reasons enough to examine the topic.
“This is a conversation that Congress needs to have,” he said.
Other speakers included Debbie Thundercloud, chief of staff to the National Indian Gaming Association; Russa Sanna, executive director of the National Center for Responsible Gaming; Tim Murphy, former deputy director of the FBI; and Ethan Wilson, policy director of commerce and financial services at the National Conference on State Legislatures.
The panelists highlighted the vast scope of the illegal sports betting market and the problems associated with it.
“The truth is (that) no one knows how big it is, but we all know that it’s taking place,” Slane explained.
From a law enforcement perspective, the largest such problem is that illegal gambling and sports betting rings serve as revenue streams for organized crime groups, which provides resources for them to engage in other forms of nefarious behavior.
Murphy emphasized that the link between illegal gambling and crime groups runs deeper than most realize.
“There isn’t a case [the FBI] touches that isn’t connected to illegal gambling,” he said.
Wilson argued that for the NCSL, which is a resource body for state legislators and their staffs, the decision by the Supreme Court to take up New Jersey’s appeal for a partial repeal of its sports betting prohibitions will have wide-ranging impacts on how the federal government can dictate state-level policy on other matters.
“States are watching it very closely because of the anti-commandeering aspect to this case,” he said. “It’s going to have repercussions for the way states legislate, moving forward, on a number of different issues.”
