NEW ORLEANS – The incoming Trump Administration will provide a friendly environment to the gaming industry, a panel of high-profile officials reaffirmed Friday.
Donald Trump’s election, as well as Republican control of the House and Senate, will create a more hands off approach to all areas of government control, said American Gaming Association president Bill Miller. Speaking at Friday’s meeting of the National Council of Legislators from Gaming States (NCLGS), Miller said influence from businessmen including Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will mean less pressure from the federal government.
“There isn’t going to be a federal department of gaming with Elon and Vivek,” Miller said.
State-level control
Miller reaffirmed Friday the industry’s preference for state-level control. Miller said several decades of commercial casino gaming outside Nevada and New Jersey has underscored the success of regulation at the state level.
Industry figures have pushed against most major federal proposals, including a sweeping sports betting regulation proposal introduced earlier this year that would restrict advertising and create additional federal mandates. Federal officials have previously understood successful state policies, Miller said, which will encourage the national government in the incoming administration to leave states to their current regulatory practices.
Miller cautioned that the incoming Congress, which includes 10 new senators and more than 60 members of the House of Representatives, creates a new political environment. Despite the potential changes, he said that many of the incoming federal lawmakers served in state legislators where they likely worked on sports betting or casino legislation.
That background for members of the incoming Congress, along with a business-friendly stance in the White House, will maintain a healthy environment for gaming.
“We're pushing on an open door generally because they have respect for what we mean in the states where we are and generally they don't feel the need to bring their umbrella over them,” Miller said.
Major shifts in federal approach unlikely
The most significant threat to legal gaming in Trump’s first term was a re-interpretation of the federal Wire Act, a bill passed in the 1960s that restricts interstate transmission of sports bets. The Trump administration ruled the bill extended to all forms of online gaming, not just sports betting, an interpretation that was challenged successfully in the courts.
Dave Rebuck, then the director of the New Jersey Department of Gaming Enforcement, joined the suit to stop the revised interpretation. Speaking at Friday’s NCLGS conference, Rebuck said that the decision was influenced by Trump campaign donor Sheldon Adelson, the founder of Las Vegas Sands casinos and an outspoken online gambling opponent.
Adelson’s death in 2021 removes an external pressure, Rebuck said. He said it was too early to know for certain if he’d revisit such a move and the industry should take a wait-and-see approach, but the gaming industry’s success with online gaming presents an effective case why it should be allowed to continue operating.
“I’m optimistic that evidence-based presentation to the Administration would show that the current interpretation has served the country well,” Rebuck said.
National attitudes shift
The encouraging business environment for gaming comes as the national public opinion becomes increasingly favorable for the industry, multiple speakers said Friday.
National polling shows that the majority of Americans support gaming or at least the right for others to do so. Politically, this gives cover to lawmakers that back policies that support gambling, said NCLGS president Shawn Fluharty, a Democratic delegate from West Virginia.
The political risk for state lawmakers to back gaming legislation is "basically zero," West Virginia Delegate and NCLGS President Shawn Fluharty said during today's conference; Fluharty has been one of the state's (and nation's) most outspoken gaming supporters
— Ryan Butler (@ButlerBets) December 13, 2024
This also applies for Republicans. Though GOP voters have tended to be more religious, politically conservative, and against gambling, studies from gaming pollster Jim Kitchens discussed at Friday's conference show that dwindling religious participation has further eroded the political strength for gambling opponents.
Former Republican Mississippi Gov. Hayley Barbour, whose state was one of the first in the country to permit commercial casino gaming, said many people that opposed the 1990 legislation that brought casino gaming supported it by the time he took office in 2005. He said it “absolutely” is not looked upon as a political detriment.
“There’s hardly anybody who is going to make a fight out of gaming,” Barbour said.
