Despite comments from Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, lawmakers continue to push forward with efforts to change the state constitution to allow for sports betting in Texas.
After effectively shedding its in-person registration requirement on the first day of the new year, William Hill US made quick work of launching its enhanced William Hill Sports Book App and website in Iowa. The Hawkeye State was one of the first Midwestern states to authorize both online and retail sports betting, which launched in August 2019 just 94 days after Governor Kim Reynolds signed. William Hill – Your Best Online Betting Experience For over 80 years, William Hill has been the most trusted name in bookmaking. Now William Hill has developed the most dependable and exciting site in online betting and online casinos. William Hill - A name you can trust since 1934. William Hill knows that for Irish football fans, football betting is important. With William Hill, members can easily place bets on all the matches, all the leagues, all the players all the time. Online betting is easy whether you’re wagering on the English Premier League, the Northern Irish Premiership, or any match around the world. William Hill was one of two online sports betting operators approved for licensing Friday by the Tennessee Education Lottery Corp. However, the company’s rollout in the Volunteer State has been.
The most recent effort comes from Rep. Dan Huberty (R), who filed a bill proposing a constitutional amendment.
Earlier this month, while speaking on a local radio show, Patrick said sports betting was “not going to see the light of day” in Texas.
So far, there have been four bills filed in 2021, all pertaining to the legalization of sports wagering.
Multiple Texas sports betting bills in play
The most recent bill, HB 20270, introduced by Huberty, proposes a constitutional amendment to allow the legislature to legalize Texas sports betting.
The other three bills filed were all from Democratic members of the House and Senate.
- H 1121 filed by Rep. Harold Dutton (D) in January.
- SJR 36, filed by Sen. Roland Gutierrez (D) in February.
- SJR 39, filed by Sen. Juan Hinojosa (D) on Feb. 23.
With an 18-13 Republican-controlled Senate, Democrats would need help from eight colleagues across the aisle. To send a constitutional amendment to voters, 21 votes are needed.
Professional sports teams back legislative efforts in Texas
Several powerful allies in the form of professional sports teams have come to the defense of sports betting. Most recently, the Dallas Cowboys (NFL), Dallas Mavericks (NBA), and Texas Rangers (MLB) have all banned together to push the issue through the state legislature.
Charlotte Jones, executive vice-presidents and chief brand officer for the Dallas Cowboys, told The Dallas Morning News:
“Unregulated and illegal sports gambling is already taking place in the State of Texas. Legalized sports betting would regulate the industry and generate hundreds of millions of dollars of new revenue for the state which will help fund critical programs without raising taxes.”
Casino industry also sees value in legal Texas gambling
On top of legislative efforts and the backing of professional sports teams, the casino industry is also targeting Texas.
Before his death, the owner of Las Vegas Sands, billionaire Sheldon Adelson, hired eight Texas lobbyists ahead of the state’s legislative session. Additionally, Adelson and his wife also donated $4.5 million to Republican campaigns for the state House during the 2020 cycle.
Political contributions don’t necessarily correlate to passing legislation. But they can be viewed as conversation starters. Politicians in California, Florida, and Texas have received several campaign contributions from gaming operators like DraftKings and FanDuel, who view the three as lucrative hubs for sports betting.
Legalized sports wagering in Texas must still navigate a gauntlet of opposition. But the introduction of another new bill, this time by a Republican party member, shows there is legislative interest across the aisle.
The Majestic Princess is scheduled to disembark from Los Angeles World Cruise Center a day before next year’s Super Bowl LVI, plow out into the Pacific Ocean and then southward for a seven-day, three-port voyage to the Mexican Riviera.
Once the Southern California coast has been put 12 miles in the distance, the casino will open, as usual. And for the first time on any cruise line, so will the sportsbook. The cruisers can place their bets while fans back on shore won’t be legally allowed to bet on the Super Bowl taking place at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. (Sports betting isn’t legalized in California.)
Revelers onboard the Majestic Princess – in their rooms or along railings angling for the sunset – will be able to with a new mobile sports betting platform Princess Cruises plans to debut as part of a plan to layer customers with amenities after the industry re-opens following a year-long-plus COVID-19 shutdown.
Maximizing cruise passenger amenities
The so-called Ocean Sportsbook will be available on all Princess ships to customers that purchase the “Medallion Class experience.”
But why and why now? Partly the explosive growth of legal sports betting handle on dry land in the United States, said Shelley Wise, Princess Cruises vice president of integrated marketing. And, as usual, COVID-19 was a factor after Princess suspended operations last March with the rest of the cruise industry.
“During this down-time we’ve worked behind the scenes to re-engineer our operation to give guests maximum control of their cruise vacation,” Wise told PlayUSA in an email.
What's new when you get back on board? Stay connected to your favorite teams, sports, and even award shows! With Ocean Sportsbook, place bets to win real money from the convenience of your mobile device. https://t.co/YBC3BwsNrR
— Princess Cruises (@PrincessCruises) February 2, 2021
The Ocean Sportsbook will run on a Miomni platform. The English company lists Boyd Gaming, Caesars Entertainment, Golden Nugget, Paddy Power and Wynn Las Vegas among its 15 gaming clients.
According to a company release, passengers will be able to wager on a phone app aided by “elite level bandwidth with MedallionNet powered by SES, allowing for enhanced connected experiences like Ocean Sportsbook.”
Wagering on the Miami Heat will be disallowed because Princess is owned by Carnival Corporation, whose CEO, Micky Arison, owns the NBA team.
Gambling on water is a complicated American legacy
Floating and gambling has been a part of the American experience since before the Third Great Awakening sent cardsharps onto riverboats to escape religious zeal and laws of the land. It rose as a regulated industry when Iowa became the first state to legalize riverboat casinos in 1989 and the Gulf of Mexico has been plied by scores of day-trip casino boats with a dubious legacy such as the “cruises to nowhere” in Florida.
Currently, cruise ships are allowed to open casinos, and now, sportsbooks, once reaching the 12-mile international line. So are US-flagged ships since the passage of the Cruise Ship Competitiveness Act of 1991, although much of the industry remains registered in other countries. The regulation of slot machines and tables is administered by the International Council of Cruise Lines.
Though the Majestic Princess is registered in the United Kingdom, most of the Princess Cruises fleet is “flagged” in Bermuda. As noted by attorney Caitlin E. Burke in her paper “A Qualitative Study of Victimization and Legal Issues Relevant to Cruise Ships,” cruise lines have been registering their ships in nations with amenable laws and “circumventing U.S. statutes and regulations since as early as the 1920s.”
Burke cited another report on the practice of registering ships in other nations: “By opting to re-flag in a new nation, a vessel owner becomes subject to the safety, labor and environmental codes of that nation. Thus, those nations whose open registries have become the most popular also tend to be those who possess the most lax labor, safety and environmental codes.”
So while sports betting in California – or Florida, the disembarkation point for much of the domestic cruise ship industry – is illegal, it is in the UK and Bermuda. Some legal scholars have posited whether prostitution would be deemed legal aboardHolland America Line, which is registered in the Netherlands.
Will cruise ship passengers take time for sports betting?
Even with the plethora of on-board activities currently available on modern cruise ships – eating, drinking, lounging, golfing, tubing, eating and drinking some more – Wise believes the mobile aspect will attract bettors who already watch sports all around the ship.
“With our casinos only operational when we are at sea, spending time in the casino becomes part of the entertainment experience onboard,” she said. “We also find our guests watching major sporting events together in our outdoor amphitheater, Movies Under the Stars, where Sportsbook can now also be used.”
An informal social media poll of professed sports bettors found an eagerness for the service. Whether passengers out for a typical cruise experience would partake is theoretically crucial for success, however.
Victor Matheson, an economics professor at the College of the Holy Cross and a gambling industry analyst, believes however, that adding a sportsbook will be “tepidly successful at best” for cruise ship lines.
“The reason no one did that before is almost certainly because no one places sports bets on cruise ships. And, actually, even in casinos, people don’t place as many sports bets,” he told PlayUSA, noting that sports betting had accounted for less than 3% of Nevada gaming revenue until 2020. “All the rest is on the other games. So a cruise ship adding a sportsbook would be needlessly expensive for the amount of gambling you would expect going on there, at least if you think a cruise ship casino is going to act something like a Las Vegas casino.
William Hill Online Betting Sports Betting Poker Casino Bingo Games Real Money
“And it might even be less, because part of the allure of placing a bet in a Vegas casino is then watching all the games. If you don’t have really, really good sports bars because of lack of satellite TV access or just too many other entertainment options for people on the cruise ships, it might be even less interesting because no one wants to spend their time on the cruise ship at the sports bar because you can do that at home.”