[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 141 (Thursday, August 23, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5907-S5908]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SPORTS BETTING
Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I wish to begin on the topic of sports
betting.
In May, the Supreme Court cleared the way for any State to legalize
sports betting, which had been prohibited in all but a handful of
States since 1992.
I would like to say upfront, I am not a fan of sports betting. I have
grave concerns about gambling in general and sports betting in
particular. There is no question that sports betting, like other types
of gambling and addictive behavior, has ruined far too many lives. Add
to those deleterious social effects the threat sports betting poses to
the integrity of the game, and we can see why the prohibition on sports
wagering in the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act passed
the Senate 88 to 5. I authored this legislation--and fought tooth and
nail to get it passed--because I knew that without it, sports gambling
would corrupt the integrity of the game.
Despite these views, I am also a realist. With the nearly $5 billion
annually in legal sports wagers in Nevada, plus an estimated $150
billion a year in illegal sports wagers in the United States, we can't
put the genie back in the bottle. Prohibition is not a possibility or a
prudent path forward.
Instead, now that States are free to legalize sports betting, our
goal should be to bring that illegal wagering activity into well-
regulated, legal markets that can better protect consumers and the
integrity of sports. As I wrote in Sports Illustrated earlier this
year, ``Sports Betting is Inevitable--Let's Make Sure It's Done
Right.''
To do it right, we need to ensure that State regulatory frameworks
are not a race to the bottom. I firmly believe we need a set of
fundamental Federal standards that will protect the integrity of the
game, that will protect consumers and the sports wagering market.
Since the Supreme Court decision in May, sports betting has been
conspicuously absent from the public dialogue on Capitol Hill. A
hearing on the issue was scheduled by the House Judiciary Committee but
then postponed, and I hope it will be rescheduled so Congress can
explore what a post-PASPA world would look like.
Sports betting implicates a whole host of complex issues, and I have
been diving into those issues as I work toward draft legislation that
will establish some much needed guardrails to protect the integrity of
the game. I am grateful for all the guidance and insight many
stakeholders have provided, and I invite others who are interested to
do the same.
Let me pause for a moment to discuss integrity--a word frequently
used in the sports betting debate but often left undefined. In the
context of sports, integrity is used to describe events that are
recognized as honest and genuine competition. There is a reason
predetermined outcomes in professional wrestling attract a small
fraction of the following enjoyed by baseball, football, basketball,
and other sports. The integrity of sport--the sense that the game is a
real competition free from outside influence--is what attracts fans and
keeps them coming back.
Integrity can be compromised in various ways. Take, for example, the
doping scandals in cycling that took down Lance Armstrong and led fans
to question whether races were won by the best athlete or the rider on
the best drug regimen, but there is no greater threat to sports
integrity than match fixing. There is no question a big payoff in the
sports betting market is the leading reason criminals and cheaters get
involved with match fixing.
This relationship between sports integrity and sports betting,
including match fixing, cannot be ignored. In the world of gambling,
sports betting is a unique product with unique risks. When a casino
patron pulls the handle on a slot machine or rolls the dice at a crap
table, money may change hands, but there is little connection to the
outside world. When a patron places a sports bet, however, there is the
potential--and in far too many cases it has been the reality--that the
sports wagering market is being used to profit off match fixing. There
is a connection, and not always a positive one, between the bets placed
in a casino and the outcome on the field.
The integrity concerns related to sports wagering are nothing new.
For years, billions of dollars in bets have been placed on sports each
year, presenting these very concerns, but the offshore books where the
vast majority of these wagers have been placed are under no obligation
to take steps to mitigate the threats to integrity. As States move to
legalize sports betting and bring that offshore activity into the
regulated market, they should be taking reasonable steps to protect the
integrity of sports and the marketplace. We can, and should, expect
more from the legal operators than those in the illicit market, and
those legal operators are quickly getting in the game. It would be a
mistake to think that seeming disinterest in the issue at the Federal
level has carried over to the States. States, understandably so, seek
legalized sports betting as a way to bring in much needed tax revenue.
It is amazing how quickly things get done when money is a motivator.
At the beginning of May, full-scale sports betting was available only
in Nevada. Today you can also place sports wagers in Delaware, New
Jersey, and Mississippi. Sports betting in West Virginia will
officially launch on September 1. Pennsylvania and Rhode Island may
have sports betting by the end of the year, and more than a dozen other
States have taken steps to move toward legalization. All of this is
progress in just the past 3 months.
Watching this flurry of activity in the States has only underscored
for me the need for some consistent, minimum standards to protect the
integrity of sports and the sports wagering market.
Let's look at a specific example. Who should be allowed to place a
sports wager? Imagine if players or referees were able to place wagers
on games in which they were participating. They certainly have the
ability to influence the outcome, and if players or referees were
betting on the game, there could be reason to question their actions on
the field. How could fans have faith that the outcome is the result of
honest competition and not an intentional effort to get the biggest
payout?
I suspect there is a fairly broad consensus that certain categories
of folks should not be able to place bets on certain events. For
instance, players should not be allowed to place bets, and certainly
not referees. But the
[[Page S5908]]
West Virginia sports-betting regulations approved in June don't say
that. In fact, they leave it to each sports book to decide whose
participation in sports betting might undermine the integrity of a
sports event.
It is odd that this decision would be left to the sports books, such
that an individual may be prohibited from placing the bet at one sports
book in the State but would be permitted to do so at another. The
decision to leave this integrity decision to the sports books is even
more concerning when you consider the potential conflict in the duties
and motivation of the sports books.
Operators certainly want to protect integrity so that they are not
accepting wagers on fixed games, but the West Virginia sports-betting
law also requires sports book operators to ``assist the commission in
maximizing sports wagering revenues.'' How many folks will they really
be turning away to protect the integrity of the game if they are also
under a statutory mandate to maximize the amount of money coming in the
door?
Other States have been more specific on this point but still leave
open questions. Mississippi prohibits only coaches or participants from
betting on a particular event. What is a participant? Does it include
referees? Maybe they are a participant because they are on the field.
But what about an athletic trainer or league executives? While
Mississippi law does not answer that question, New Jersey put in place
robust laws that specifically prohibit athletic trainers and members of
a sport's governing body from placing wagers.
There is nothing wrong with there being differences among the States.
That is the beauty of our Federal system. But it does seem that when it
comes to protecting the integrity of the game and sports-betting
market, there should be some consensus--at least some minimum
standards--about who can place a wager. If States are allowed to fall
behind, those looking to illegally profit off sports betting will
simply migrate to where there are the fewest restrictions.
Protecting the integrity of sports from the dark side of sports
betting is not a theoretical exercise. We are all familiar with the
fixing of the 1919 World Series, Pete Rose's expulsion from baseball,
and points shaving at Boston college. More recently, NBA referee Tim
Donaghy both bet on games that he officiated and passed along tips to
bookies. The qualifying match for this year's World Cup had to be
replayed after the referee was found to have fixed the match. Just last
month, there were signs of possible match fixing in a men's doubles
match at Wimbledon.
As States move to legalize sports wagering, we must seize the
opportunity to put in place world-class measures to protect the
integrity of our sporting events and the sports-betting market. To that
end, an important part of the legislation I will be proposing is
improvements to monitoring and enforcement that will benefit all of the
stakeholders--sports books, regulators, governing bodies, and
consumers.
These are complex issues, but I am happy to announce that much
progress is being made. I look forward to continuing engagement with
stakeholders and in the coming weeks releasing a legislative proposal
to kick-start the much needed sports-betting discussion on Capitol
Hill.
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