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Mississippi House passes bill to allow mobile sports betting tied to casinos; 12% tax directed to counties
Summary
The Mississippi House approved House Bill 1302 to legalize mobile sports betting tethered to brick-and-mortar casinos, impose a 12% tax whose revenue will be distributed to all 82 counties for roads and bridges, and create a five-year $6 million protection fund for smaller casinos. The bill passed on a roll-call vote of 88-10.
The Mississippi House on the floor approved House Bill 1302 on final passage to legalize mobile sports betting in the state, require online platforms to be tethered to brick-and-mortar casinos, and levy a 12% tax whose revenue will be distributed to all 82 counties for roads and bridges.
Representative Morgan, chairman of the Gaming Committee, who sponsored the measure, said the bill keeps mobile sports wagering linked to physical casinos and allows two platform partners per casino. “As I told y'all last year, I am committed to, and this bill is still committed to, our bricks and mortar casinos. So all mobile sports betting will still be tethered to a bricks and mortar casino in the state of Mississippi,” Morgan said.
The bill sets several technical and consumer rules: it does not allow credit cards for wagers and contemplates other electronic payment methods such as debit cards, Venmo and PayPal; it requires geofencing so bets must be placed from within Mississippi; and it contains age-verification language for regulators. Morgan also said the bill includes language requested by the Senate related to leasing of public-trust tidelands that was carried forward for conference discussion.
House Bill 1302 imposes a 12% tax on mobile sports betting equivalent to the current tax on casinos. According to the sponsor’s floor explanation, the tax revenue will be distributed across all 82 counties for roads and bridges. Morgan described a transitional safety net for smaller casinos: for the first five years the first $6,000,000 collected each year will go into a fund the bill calls the Sports Wagering Protection Act, from which struggling casinos could draw down; any portion of that $6,000,000 not used in a year would then go to roads and bridges.
Members pressed the sponsor on implementation details and local impacts. A Representative from Adams asked whether geofencing could be configured regionally so revenue from bets placed in a given area would be directed to the nearby casino; the sponsor said the bill does not create regional geofencing tied to individual casinos and that the proposal instead spreads tax revenue to all counties because not every county hosts a casino. Lawmakers also questioned whether large platforms would refuse to partner with smaller casinos; Morgan said platform partnerships are private business decisions and that he had not been told companies would deny a casino partnership.
The sponsor cited out-of-state revenue as context for the bill, saying other states have generated significant tax receipts after adopting mobile wagering: Tennessee ($97,000,000), Louisiana ($64,000,000) and North Carolina (about $96,000,000 from March through Dec., per the sponsor’s floor remarks). He also said Mississippi currently ranks high in online searches for illegal sports-betting sites such as Bovada, arguing legalization would shift wagers to regulated platforms.
On final passage the House voted by recorded ballot: 88 yeas, 10 nays, and the bill was approved. The record on the floor included previous unanimous procedural actions to suspend rules, consider the bill engrossed and to adopt a committee substitute for consideration in lieu of the original bill. The bill’s sponsor yielded the floor for questions before the vote.
The transcript did not record further legislative steps or an effective date for the measure.
