Senate passes bill to ban phone- and internet-facilitated lottery play after floor probe

The Texas Senate on final passage approved SB 28, a bill that creates criminal offenses for lottery games played or facilitated by telephone or through an internet or mobile application, after a floor debate prompted by allegations that courier operations and agency rule changes enabled widespread fraud.

Senator Brian Hall, sponsor of SB 28, told colleagues the bill responds to years of what he described as the Texas Lottery Commission’s failure to enforce statutory guardrails. “The illegal organized crime lottery operation we now have is not the result of some smart people outside of the government figuring out how to beat the lottery system,” Hall said on the floor, arguing that commission staff and commissioners created loopholes that allowed courier services to operate in ways the legislature never intended.

The Senate rejected an amendment by Senator José Menéndez Gutierrez that would have narrowed SB 28 to exclude online scratch‑off ticket sales that fund veterans’…