Oklahoma Eyes Sports Betting Legalization in Upcoming Session

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00:00Let's focus on Oklahoma. I know a legislative session is coming up in February.

00:04They'd like to push things a little bit more forward. Naturally, I feel like Oklahoma and

00:08Texas are sort of intertwined. Whatever happens with one maybe happens with the other. But at

00:12least there's something in the works, although I know that there is cautious optimism. I guess

00:17that's the best way to put it right now. Yeah, there are definitely different dynamics at play

00:22when you talk about the state legislatures and the stakeholders in Oklahoma and Texas.

00:26But you're right, Craig, anything that would happen to the smaller neighbor state in Oklahoma

00:31would probably be beneficial and a good selling point for Texas to legalize. Lawmakers could say,

00:36hey, they have it. So people are driving across the state. We're losing revenue.

00:40Oklahoma, one of those states which obviously has a lot of interest in professional sports,

00:45they have Oklahoma City Thunder, best team in the NBA, their colleges as well, Oklahoma,

00:50Oklahoma State draw a lot of interest as well. So people have been clamoring for sports betting

00:55in Oklahoma for a while. You have some hope. A bill was filed just before the legislature took

01:00a break at the end of the year that would legalize sports betting in the state. Now,

01:05the big roadblock there has been whether or not you can get the Native American tribes on board

01:12and whether or not you can get them all on board together to make this happen. The tribes have

01:16essentially been at odds with the governor who proposed a mechanism of legalizing sports betting

01:22a few years ago that would have excluded some tribes. And now you have this bill that was

01:27filed by Senator Dave Rader, which would essentially require that at least four tribes

01:33in the state all agree to offer sports betting. And then they enter contracts with online gaming

01:38companies like FanDuel, DraftKings, BetMGM or whomever. And then they would all have to agree

01:43to offer sports betting together as opposed to a state like Florida, where there's a monopoly

01:48dominated by the Seminoles with Hard Rock. And you've obviously had other tribes have taken

01:54issue with that, filing lawsuits against it. So I wouldn't say that it's a great,

01:59clear path ahead, but it is promising that you now have this bill. The big question here will

02:04be whether or not the tribes and the governor can mend their relationships from a few years ago.

02:10So we'll see what develops. But with only a few states left on the board to legalize,

02:14you could definitely throw Oklahoma in that ring of next closest to this year.