Minnesota's New Sports Betting Bill Targets Responsible Gaming

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00:00Let's get to this very bizarre, to me, story that you guys have posted at legalsportsreport.com,

00:09which is a new sports betting bill in Minnesota, which is surrounding responsible gaming.

00:13And again, nothing wrong with that.

00:15See it everywhere, happening all over the country and in Canada as well.

00:19But Minnesota does not have legalized sports betting, Pat.

00:22So what kind of responsibility should people be taking if it's all illegal anyway?

00:27I don't get it.

00:29So this is, you're right.

00:32It's an interesting situation in general.

00:34I mean, Minnesota, as we've talked about a lot in the past couple of years, has always

00:38been one of the states that we're looking at to legalize.

00:40It's very close.

00:41It's come very close a couple of years in a row.

00:43However, there's a lot of parties at play here.

00:45It's a very state with a lot of Democrat control and a lot of Republican control there.

00:51And of course, this is an issue that needs bipartisan support because there's a lot of

00:55detractors on both sides.

00:57Getting into this next session that starts next month, we know there will be a couple

01:00bills, one from a Republican senator who has been a proponent and one likely from Zach

01:06Stevenson, a Democrat who has led this process the last couple of years with full Democratic

01:12control.

01:13Now, the House is now in Republican control and the Senate's pretty much 50-50.

01:18So it's going to be even tougher for this to happen.

01:21What's going to throw in another wrench here is the Senator John Marty's bill.

01:26It would enact sports betting, but he's been somewhat of an opponent in the years past.

01:32And there's been times he's introduced amendments that have been criticized by the industry

01:39and said, this will harm our industry if this actually happens.

01:44And yeah, so like he calls sports betting predatory, but he's admitting that it happens

01:50illegally.

01:51So you might as well legalize it.

01:52Let's put in lots of responsible gambling guardrails, I suppose, for lack of a better

01:57term.

01:58And it does that.

02:00Again, the industry probably is not a fan of this bill.

02:04There's again, a lot of guardrails.

02:05It bans in-game betting, college prop bets.

02:10The taxes rate would be 40%, which it's not New York at 51%, but it's very high in comparison

02:16to a lot of other states.

02:20A lot of it is good, of course, because responsible gambling is something we need to champion

02:24and it is very important.

02:25But it is of note that he is an opponent generally to sports betting and his amendments and likely

02:31this bill have raised a lot of concerns from the industry.

02:36So again, it probably won't even get a ton of play.

02:39The other two bills likely will, and then he'll pull these in and maybe get it down

02:44to some amendments.

02:46But I guess that's the thing to look at.

02:48This has been a very tight process the last couple of years.

02:51Last year, it was supposedly right at the finish line and just didn't get a vote.

02:57And it's going to take a lot of compromise.

02:58And so you have to imagine John Marty's responsible gambling concerns will be addressed at least

03:05somewhat and some of these will get folded into a final bill if it all passes.

03:09We'll see.

03:10Again, it's probably the best chance the state has.

03:13But again, it's come very close and failed the last couple of years, so it might again.

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