Minnesota lawmakers face sports betting debate after November elections

A report suggests that the outcome of Minnesota's 3 November vote may reshape the prospects for legal sports betting, a question on which the legislature has so far been unable to agree. Voters will fill every one of the 134 House seats and 67 Senate seats, and the two major parties currently hold near-equal strength in each chamber. Among the small group of US states without legal online sports betting or commercial retail sportsbooks is Minnesota; it hosts a number of tribal casinos, yet no regulated sports wagering framework has been enacted by lawmakers.

Under the DFL's preferred framework, mobile wagering would be reserved for tribal operators, who could run it themselves or join forces with established gambling companies. A compromise was eventually struck among tribal nations, charitable gaming organizations and the state's two horse tracks, designed to keep tribal exclusivity intact while sharing financial benefits with other stakeholders, yet it failed to win enough legislative backing for a bill. Should the DFL enlarge its majority, legalization backers might find more leeway to advance the tribal-led model, the report notes, although certain DFL legislators are still unwilling to sign off on any gambling expansion.

On the Republican side, the prevailing preference has been a broader licensing system in which racetracks and charitable gaming groups would join tribal operators. The weaknesses of that route showed in 2022: the House passed a tribal-controlled sports betting plan, a Senate committee then broadened it to cover racetracks, and tribal opposition doomed the revised measure. A bigger Republican win might revive demands for a more open sports betting framework, the report states, but the party's legislators are not of one mind about how wagering in Minnesota ought to work.

Public opinion seems to lean toward allowing sports betting despite the impasse: a 2022 SurveyUSA poll recorded 64% of respondents in favor and only 17% opposed. According to the report, the November election will determine which party commands the votes needed to enact new laws, yet several of the central disagreements that have kept Minnesota from adopting legal sports betting are still without a resolution.