Mississippi Online Sports Betting Bill Still Alive, Moves to Full Senate

• A House-approved online sports betting bill moved out of a Senate committee this morning
• The Senate Committee on Gaming moved the bill forward with a “do pass” motion
• The bill would allow online sports betting for 26 casinos in the state

Remember Mississippi online sports betting? It’s back…and in House committee form!

This morning the Senate Committee on Gaming moved Rep. Casey Eure’s (HB 774) Mississippi Mobile Sports Wagering Act ahead with a “do pass” approval.

The bill now moves to the full Senate, which has until April 11 to approve the bill.

Sports Betting Bill Lives On

The Mississippi Senate Gaming Committee met for less than two minutes this morning and moved the bill ahead to the Senate with a “do pass” motion.

The bill allows each of the 26 Mississippi casinos to partner with a sports betting company to offer online sports betting throughout the state. Currently, online sports betting is only legal while on casino property.

It was approved by the House two months ago by a 97-14 vote.

Sen. David Blount (D-29), gaming committee chairman, said the committee’s action this morning was to “move the bill along” to the Senate for consideration.

“If people are talking, it’s a good thing. We want to continue to let them do that. We want to continue to move the bill along. There are a lot of issues that we need to consider, from the perspective of the industry and also from the perspective of the consumer, that we will do if we get to the point where we might be able to get something done this year. In the meantime, we don’t want to stop people from listening to each other and working,” he said.

The committee moved the online sports betting bill on with unanimous approval.

The Senate has until April 11 to approve the bill with a necessary three-fifths majority.

Mississippi Bill Details

The bill was amended by the House during its floor vote, which dedicates all online sports betting tax revenue into the state’s emergency road and bridge repair fund.

The bill includes a tiered tax system for adjusted sports betting revenue as follows:

• 4% of gross revenue not surpassing $50,000 per month
• 6% of gross revenue that surpasses $50,000, but does not surpass $134,000 per month
• 8% of gross revenue that surpasses $134,000 per month

Each operator will also have to pay an additional 4% in gross revenue into the road and bridge repair fund. Operators would have to pay a maximum of 12% in adjusted gross revenue to the state depending on their revenue each month. Based on fiscal estimates,  the state could see annual sports betting tax revenues anywhere from $25 million to $35 million each year.

There are currently 26 commercial dockside and land-based casinos in Mississippi. Under this bill, each would be eligible to partner with one sports betting company to offer online sports betting in the state. However, there are no limits to how many casinos each sports betting operator can partner with. So, in theory, Mississippi could have just a handful of sports betting operators partnering with all of the casinos in the state.