State Rep. Chris Blackshear appeared on Montgomery's Sports Radio 740 last week to discuss the Alabama House of Representatives' efforts to pass a comprehensive gambling and lottery bill during the 2024 legislative session. The bill has been a fixture in many past legislative sessions. In 2024, Blackshear (R-Phenix City) said the bill the House approved would be similar to one passed by the Alabama Senate in 2021.

Blackshear connected Alabama's sports betting environment to former Alabama baseball coach Brad Bohannon as the reason legal sports betting is needed from a regulatory standpoint.

“The part about sports betting that nobody understands is coming from politicians. They think it's not true. But if you have to legalize it in order to regulate it, that's only one part of this whole comprehensive package,” Blackshear said, referring to the fact that Bohannon was arrested in Ohio, a state where gambling is both legal and regulated.

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“The only reason the coaches got caught up in it is because the individuals who were placing the bets were in states where sports betting is regulated and legal. If the bets had been placed on Bovada in Alabama or on any other site, neither of them would have been caught.”

The moderator emphasized that statistics show Alabama has one of the largest illegal sports betting economies in the U.S. Blackshear said the state will not be able to regulate or tax those revenues for at least another year, before lawmakers revisit the issue in February 2025.

“I'm surprised they're not trying to benefit from the tax base,” he said. “Don't get me wrong, there are influences outside the state, but over 90 percent of the opposition to this bill comes from within the state of Alabama.”

He criticized the Senate for watering down a comprehensive gambling bill passed by the House that included provisions on sports and casino gambling.

“So this was totally slammed down, slammed down to the point that it needed a different bill number and a different sponsor,” he said of the Senate amendment. “They've heard all sorts of things, including intimidation tactics from groups around the state who say they don't support the officials who voted for the bill.”

Blackshear said the failure was especially frustrating given the level of public support for a gambling bill, citing polling showing 71 percent of Republicans want to vote for a comprehensive gambling bill and 89 percent support a lottery vote.

Michael Browner is a senior sports analyst and contributor to Yellow Hammer News. You can follow him on Twitter. translation: