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With less than three weeks left until voters go to the polls to determine who resides in the White House for the next four years, down-ballot in several states will be initiatives that will directly impact the gaming industry.
Currently, the race between Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris is close in several key battleground states, such as Pennsylvania and Michigan.
But in Arkansas, where voters could determine that fate of a fourth casino in Pope County, and in Missouri, where sports betting and a new casino are on the ballot, Trump enjoys double-digit leads over Harris.
Supporters of legalized sports betting in Missouri have donated millions of dollars in an effort to garner voter backing of Amendment 2 on November 5.
Winning for Missouri Education has reportedly raised more $32m, all via contributions from DraftKings and FanDuel.
The coalition is also supported by the state’s professional sports franchises, including the National Hockey League’s St. Louis Blues and the Kansas City Chiefs of the National Football League.
Missourians Against the Deceptive Online Gambling Amendment, which includes support from Caesars Entertainment, has raised a reported $14m in an attempt to lure voters into voting against Amendment 2, according to the Missouri Ethics Commission.
Brooke Foster, a Missourians Against the Deceptive Online Gambling Amendment spokeswoman, described the initiative as a “deceptive measure” that was written for the “financial benefit of its out-of-state” gaming companies.
“Amendment 2 is a bad deal for Missouri,” Foster said.
If approved by voters, the measure would authorize land-based sports wagering at riverboat casinos and professional sports facilities, as well as granting each team and the corporate owner of Missouri one mobile betting skin.
The Missouri Gaming Commission would also be authorized to issue two untethered mobile betting licenses, based on selection criteria that would largely appear to favor FanDuel and DraftKings as the two largest sports-betting operators in the U.S.
The measure would establish a sports-betting tax rate of 10 percent and include deductions for federal excise tax payments, plus promotional play of up to 25 percent of the operator’s total cash received for a month.
Winning for Missouri Education released a study last month that projected sports betting has the potential to generate $105m for the state’s public schools over the next five years.
“The numbers speak for themselves,” Jack Cardetti, a spokesman for Winning for Missouri Education, said as the study was released.
Opponents have questioned those estimates, noting that deductions for promotional credits mean the results could be far less than estimated.
“Teachers were told the lottery would raise a lot of money for schools but that didn’t happen. Now out-of-state gambling companies want voters to believe the same false claims about their Amendment 2,” states a 30-second ad being promoted by Missourians Against the Deceptive Online Gambling Amendment.
The effort to legalize sports betting Missouri began shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the federal ban on wagering on sporting events in May 2018.
But efforts by lawmakers to pass a sports-betting bill were routinely blocked by lawmakers who supported legalizing video gaming terminals (VGTs) as well.
Elsewhere on Election Day, Missouri voters will also determine the fate of Amendment 5 that would authorize the Missouri Gaming Commission to issue a new casino license for a project on the Osage River near the Lake of the Ozarks tourist resort. Currently, there are 13 licensed casinos in the state, all located on the Missouri and Mississippi rivers.
Arkansas Casino Remains On Ballot
The Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday (October 17) rejected the second argument of a two-part lawsuit brought against a ballot measure on the future of a casino in Pope County.
That decision means voters will decide Issue 2 on November 5.
Cherokee Nation Entertainment, along with the Arkansas Canvassing Compliance Committee (ACCC), challenged Issue 2 claiming the both the title and language of the initiative were misleading. The state Supreme Court disagreed, with Justice Shawn Womack dissenting.
“If presented as written, the proposed ‘amendment requiring local voter approval in a countywide special election for certain new casino licenses and repealing authority to issue a casino license in Pope County, Arkansas,’ would not be fair to the people of Arkansas because it is plainly misleading,” Womack wrote.
The Supreme Court on Monday unanimously rejected part of the lawsuit that claimed canvassers were improperly being paid by the number of signatures gathered.
Local Voters in Charge is the political action committee behind the ballot initiative. Cherokee Nation was awarded the state's fourth and final casino license for Pope County in late June after the Arkansas Racing Commission found that a competing application was invalid.
The Oklahoma Choctaw Nation, whose proposal was rejected by the ARC, supported the Local Voters in Charge effort to get the question on the ballot.
If approved by voters, Issue 2 would stop Cherokee Nation from building their planned casino in Pope County by rescinding the license. The measure would also require any other casino proposal in Arkansas to be approved by voters in a state-wide election and an additional vote of approval in the specific county where the facility would be located.
Voters approved four casinos in Arkansas in 2018, including one in Pope County. While the other three casinos are open for business, the Pope County license has been tied up in legal battles since gaming was approved.
Virginia Casino On Ballot; Colorado Sports-Betting Taxes
Nearly 1,000 miles to the east of Arkansas, voters in Petersburg near Richmond will decide whether the city will become the fifth in Virginia to approve a casino referendum.
In 2020, the Virginia General Assembly passed legislation establishing Bristol, Danville, Norfolk, Portsmouth and Richmond as host cities for casinos, subject to local voter approval.
Four of the five cities approved a referendum, but Richmond voters twice declined to pass a ballot initiative. That opened the door for lawmakers earlier this year to authorize a Petersburg referendum, while removing Richmond from the list of eligible casino cities.
Meanwhile, in Colorado, voters will decide whether to approve Proposition JJ, known as the Retain Sports Betting Tax Revenue for Water Projects Measure, which seeks to eliminate the current cap of $29m of annual sports-betting tax revenue the state may allocate to water conservation and projects.
The measure would instead allow the state to retain and allocate all sports-betting tax revenue for water protections programs. Currently, Colorado’s 1992 Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights requires sports-betting tax revenue exceeding $29m to be refunded to sports-betting operators and casinos.
