Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00What is the latest here? I know you have a column up at LegalSportsReport.com about casino gaming.
00:05That's the other hot topic of the year is which states are pushing this through, which are not letting it go.
00:11Yeah, you know, coming into the session in January, we saw quite a bit of states kind of thinking about let's go ahead and legalize online casino or at least talk about it, get those conversations started.
00:21Ohio is one of them. They even started it late in the session, late in the year last year because they're a full year session.
00:26And, you know, it is just getting it started. You know, there were dozens of sports betting bills, iterations that had to happen in Ohio before sports betting ultimately passed.
00:38And so, you know, we've had the study that came out last year from legislators that said, hey, this might be a good idea.
00:43It can be a great revenue driver for the state. Let's go ahead and look at it. This should be the model. We do it.
00:50It was kind of quiet in Ohio this year as a bunch of other states considered it, kind of let it go to the wayside, including neighboring Indiana.
00:56Now we're kind of looking at, you know, we're getting plenty of discussions in Ohio. There's been a couple hearings and committees in both the House and Senate.
01:07There are differing kind of details once you get to tax rates and fees and things like that.
01:13But it is basically the 11 casino and racinos in Ohio would get licenses for online casino.
01:20And we'll see where this goes. You know, they're still sitting in those committees.
01:24They've held multiple hearings and each one was for pro people who are in support of it, people who are opposing it.
01:32You got, you know, the normal people that are coming out for sports betting online casino and everything on both sides.
01:39So we'll see what happens if they advances out of either committee there.
01:44However, Governor DeWine, who we've talked about already today, has come out and said, you know, let's be cautious about this because it does put a casino in everybody's pockets.
01:53It's interesting to see him kind of come out warning against it when he's also so aggressive in the taxing of the sports betting industry.
02:01You'd think he'd say, oh, maybe we can make tax revenue from this, too.
02:06So, you know, there's kind of an interesting take from him.
02:08But, yeah, you know, Ohio is certainly the one that seems most probable that's left on the table.
02:14I know there's a new discussion in Maine that just restarted back up that I'll be covering with you later this week, probably.
02:20So, yeah, Ohio, again, as I said earlier, anything can happen in a legislative session.
02:26Maybe Ohio passes this year.
02:27Maybe it doesn't.