Minnesota's Sports Betting Legislation Faces Roadblocks

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00:00Very, very close vote here in the state of Minnesota.

00:04My gosh, like they just cannot get sports betting even close to the finish line here

00:09to get it to the next stage.

00:10And now I think it looks like, Pat, a lot of disappointment there, at least from what

00:15I'm reading, and especially over a legal sports report.

00:18A lot of people do want sports betting there, but it seems like there's just this very even

00:22battle in the legislature as to who wants it and who doesn't.

00:26Yeah, it's been obviously a really interesting journey that we've talked about for multiple

00:31years now on this show with you in Minnesota.

00:34And to your point, yeah, a lot of parties want it.

00:37You know, you've got the Democrat Farmer Labor Party on one side who want the tribes to have

00:42exclusivity.

00:43You've got the Republicans who want the horse racing tracks and charitable gaming involved.

00:47And that's what we've always thought kind of was the separation point with the two parties

00:51kind of disagreeing and needing to compromise to come into a middle agreement and say, hey,

00:56let's get this done and do it.

00:57Well, at the end of last session, we thought that was happening.

01:01You know, we had reports of a deal on the ground in the Capitol saying, hey, we've got

01:05a deal all finished up between all the stakeholders.

01:08We're just running out of time.

01:10And the session ran out of time before they could vote on it.

01:13Well, this year, I mean, you figure, okay, well, we had a deal on the table.

01:17Let's go ahead and get it over this year.

01:18Well, it started again, kind of normally.

01:21You had a Republican bill filed.

01:23You had a Democrat bill filed.

01:26You know, okay, we're kind of in the same boat.

01:29Then, you know, we had our first hearing on last week, late last week, and Senator Matt

01:34Kline, a Democrat, led his bill into this committee, the first of five or six stops,

01:42committee stops.

01:43So it is a huge journey in Minnesota, the way they put together their bills.

01:47And he started off kind of promising.

01:49He said, you know, I'm adding an amendment, which was then agreed upon by everybody on

01:54the committee, that would bring the Republican desires into it.

01:59We had a ton of testimonies from various stakeholders, including the tribes and the track and, you

02:04know, all that, saying, this is great.

02:06This is great.

02:07Well, then all of a sudden, multiple lawmakers stood up, particularly Senator May Quaid.

02:15She kind of really took a fine tooth comb to this and asked a lot of questions regarding

02:20responsible gambling and questioning kind of the way that the technology companies or

02:25the way the sports book companies kind of operate, like technology companies and social

02:30media and the algorithms to keep you in tune.

02:34Kind of putting out stipulations of, hey, if we do this, I'll be okay with it.

02:38But as it is now, it's not.

02:41And so then, yeah, we had a six to six vote on the committee, which stalemates it.

02:47It's not dead, but by any means, it can come back to that committee and then advance forward

02:53again if they work on it.

02:55But this is something that May Quaid told me in the fall was, listen, even if the stakeholders

03:00come together, there's enough negative votes in both chambers that this isn't going to

03:05get done without major responsible gambling caveats.

03:09And that's what we've seen.

03:10And immediately following that hearing, Senator John Marty, who is in opposition to sports

03:15betting but has a bill loaded with responsible gambling measures, came up and said, hey,

03:20I don't want to do this, but if we do legalize it, I want all these things in it.

03:24And then he just said, you know what, since the other bill didn't advance, let's table

03:27this.

03:28So, yeah, it's not done yet, but certainly not a good step, not a promising step for

03:34sports betting in Minnesota this year, which to your point, a lot of people in Minnesota

03:39do want it.

03:40And so that's got to be gut-wrenching to see this news early in the session.

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