Mississippi Bills on Sweepstakes Casinos & Online Sports Betting Fail Again

Mississippi lawmakers in the House and Senate have again failed to agree on how the state’s legal gambling landscape should look. The House passed a bill to legalize online sports betting, but the Senate rejected it. At the same time, the Senate passed a bill to prohibit sweepstakes casinos, but the House rejected it.

The Senate voted unanimously in favor of a ban on sweepstakes casinos, 52-0, last month. Meanwhile, the House approved legislation to legalize online sports betting.

Both bills, however, quickly died in committee after switching chambers. It is the same outcome as last year, when House lawmakers added an amendment to legalize online sports betting to the Senate-passed sweepstakes ban. The Senate then rejected the legislation.

Online Sports Betting Still on Table

This week, the House also approved a second bill that aims to legalize online sports betting. Lawmakers voted 100-11 in favor of HB4074, which sets a higher tax rate than the legislation that died in the Senate.

The bill would impose a 22% tax rate on online sportsbooks, higher than the 18% levied on retail sports betting. The bill is sponsored by Rep. Casey Eure, who also sponsored the bill that died in the Senate. Eure says the higher rate would lead to the state generating $100 million annually.

He also said that through legalization, the state could clamp down on the illegal market that already exists. He stated, “By legalizing mobile sports betting, we can eliminate much of the illegal market – including protecting underage bettors – and provide real consumer safeguards in a regulated environment.”

The legislation would allow each of the state’s 26 casinos to partner with one online sportsbook operator. HB1581, which was rejected by the Senate, proposed allowing the casinos to partner with two platforms.

In addition to legalizing online sports betting, HB4074 also proposes reducing the casino tax from 8% to 6%.

Senators Unlikely to Approve Latest Bill

The bill now moves to the Senate, where it is likely to meet the same fate as HB1581, which died in committee this week. One of the main hurdles is Sen. David Blount, the chair of the Senate Gaming Committee.

Blount, who co-sponsored the bill to prohibit sweepstakes casinos, says legalizing online sports betting does not help the economy and he will only consider approving legislation if requested by the Mississippi Gaming Commission.

He stated, “The reason we have gaming in Mississippi is to encourage investment, to create jobs, and to grow tourism to bring other people from other places to Mississippi. Mobile sports betting doesn’t do that.”

Sweepstakes Casinos Remain Gray Area

The House appears to have rejected the sweepstakes casino ban, as the bill’s text also explicitly prohibits online sports betting, which it seeks to legalize.

The bill includes “online race books, online sports pools, and online sweepstakes casino-style games” in its definition of what constitutes illegal gambling.

Rather than amending the bill to carve out legalization for online sports betting, lawmakers have flat-out rejected it this time. That means that sweepstakes casinos are not strictly prohibited in Mississippi, although the state’s Gaming Commission has taken action against operators under current laws.

Last year, the Commission sent cease-and-desist letters to 10 companies it deemed were operating illegally, including Chumba Casino. As a result, the parent company, VGW, withdrew from the state. Other platforms, such as Thrillz, Fliff, and Carnival Citi, have also blocked users in Mississippi from accessing their sites.

Mississippi Gaming Commission Executive Director Jay McDaniel stated, “Our laws are clear that casino style gaming and sports wagering are not allowed online in Mississippi, outside of a licensed casino.”

While that may be the case, the failure to explicitly prohibit sweepstakes casinos means many operators continue to accept users from the state. CasinoBeats discovered that 16 platforms list Mississippi as a restricted state, yet there are over 100 active sweepstakes casinos.