Senators in Colorado voted on Tuesday to advance a sports betting reform bill to the full chamber floor, but not before they struck a proposed ban on prop bets from the legislation.
Senate Appropriations Committee members voted narrowly 4-3 to advance the bipartisan Senate Bill 26-131 to the Committee of the Whole on April 21. It could be read at second reading there as early as April 23.
The bill, which has one Democrat and one Republican sponsor attached in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, is a wide-ranging responsible gambling bill aimed at implementing more safeguards and limitations on how licensed sports betting platforms can operate in the state.
Prop bet ban would cost too much
However, before the committee passed it on Tuesday, members approved an amendment via a 5-2 vote that scratched a proposed ban on prop wagers.
The original form of the bill proposed defining a proposition bet as one that is made on an individual athlete’s performance, a specific officiating decision, a penalty, an injury, “or any outcome other than the final result or score” of a sporting event. It would have banned all such bets, whether they were placed pre-game or live during sporting events.
However, when the bill went before Appropriations on Tuesday, a proposed amendment from Sen. Chris Kolker was attached to remove that ban on prop bets. Sen. Matt Ball noted that he and his three fellow co-sponsors of SB 26-131 consider the change to be “a friendly amendment” and one that they support.
“What this amendment does to the fiscal note now is the state revenue [from sports betting], which was originally projected to decrease by $2.4m in the next year, will now decrease by only $0.8m,” Ball noted during Tuesday’s hearing.
Bans on credit cards, push notification, and more remain
While the idea of trying to ban prop bets was abandoned, numerous player protection-focused measures remain in the version of the bill that has advanced in the Senate.
Ball noted that the bulk of the projected $800,000 decline in sports betting tax revenue in the amended version of the bill would be the result of banning credit cards, another provision included in the legislation. It’s worth noting that several leading licensed sportsbooks in Colorado, including DraftKings, FanDuel, and BetMGM, have already banned the use of credit cards for online sports betting nationwide.
Ball said the companies that have banned credit cards comprise around 97% of Colorado’s online sports betting market. “This really just closes the gap on the remaining 3% of the sports betting market that is not voluntarily making this change,” he added.
Other things the bill would do include:
- Banning push notifications or text messages that prompt users to place bets
- Banning sports betting advertising via broadcast channels between 8 a.m. and 10 p.m. or during live broadcasts of sports games
- Banning sportsbooks from limiting users’ betting activity “because an individual obtains a financial benefit as a result of placing the bet or due to the individual’s betting activities,” unless the activity was identified as either suspicious or indicative of a gambling disorder
- Limiting the number of deposits bettors can make in a 24-hour period to five
- Prohibiting the use of language such as “bonus bet” or “no sweat” in sportsbook marketing and advertising
- Bolstering data collection related to sports betting activity
SB 26-131 must still pass in the full Senate and work its way through the House before the end of the legislative session in mid-May if it is to reach the governor’s desk and have a chance of becoming law.
Louisiana also dropped prop bet ban over fiscal concerns
As states continue to grapple with budget concerns, Colorado is the second state in a few weeks to abandon a proposed ban on prop betting due to fears over lost revenue.
In late March, Louisiana Sen. Katrina Jackson-Andrews withdrew her Senate Bill 354, which aimed to ban prop wagers and in-game “micro-bets” on individual plays after a fiscal note projected that the changes would cause a decrease of up to $21m annually in the sports betting tax revenue allocated toward the state’s General Fund.
“It is an extremely serious issue that I need to revisit without this type of fiscal note on it,” Jackson-Andrews said. “I realize the serious nature of what it does to the budget.”
The Louisiana senator said she plans to revisit the idea in 2027 with a new measure next year that better considers the fiscal costs.
