Washington State A Few Signatures Away From Legal Sports Betting

Washington State looks poised to be one of the slew of jurisdictions readying for a late-summer launch of a legal sports betting platform. The latest step on the long road for legislators in the state came Thursday when The Washington State Gambling Commission signed off on a draft set of rules and regulations for 15 tribal gaming compacts that would modernize the agreements and expand the gambling language in the existing compacts to include legal sports betting.

It was a 7-0 vote Thursday by The Washington State Gambling Commission. Now only a few signatures are left to collect before Governor Jay Inslee's wish, that started when he originally signed a legal sports betting bill into law in March 2020, will come true.

Washington State, while not a big fish in the broader US legal sports betting scene, is a medium-tier jurisdiction that will bring an estimated 7.6 million US residents into the US legal sports betting fold. Its inclusion as the 13th most populous state in the country would allow the whole of the US legal sports betting industry to surge past the 50% threshold of citizens allowed to legally place a sports wager.

Tribal Effect

As with the current wagering rules and regulations state, the Washington tribes would keep their virtual monopoly on gambling through the new and updated compact. The new deal directly effects 15 of Washington's federally recognized tribes that currently house gambling operations and will expand by the fall, if everything goes as planned.

The Tulalip, Suquamish, Kalispel, Snoqualmie, Colville, Cowlitz, Jamestown S’Kallam, Lummi, Muckleshoot, Puyallup, Shoalwater Bay, Spokane, Squaxin Island, Stillaguamish, and Swinomish tribes all currently have wagering infrastructure in place and will be in line to launch legal sports betting immediately.

Each of the tribes will expand their current retail gambling spaces to include sportsbooks. Each would be able to host a mobile platform as well with any mobile wagering having to take place on tribal lands.

The Platform

Once the dust has settled and the ink has dried on all of the documents necessary for a legal sports betting launch in Washington, bettors in the state will be able to bet on global pro sports, college sports (minus the in-state teams) international sports including the Olympics and eSports. The betting menus will be reminiscent of other existing and prospective legal sports betting jurisdictions.

Under the compact agreement, there will be both retail and mobile wagering opportunities for Washington bettors. Arguably the biggest controversy from the language so far surrounds the mobile betting scene.

Mobile bettors in Washington will be forced to sign up for betting apps in person, meaning that a trip to a casino will be necessary to gain the right to place a bet from your mobile device. Such a policy has been controversial and has proven to be just marginally effective in states like Nevada and Illinois where remote sign-up isn't an option. Mobile bets will have to take place from tribal lands anyway in Washington, until that rule is looked at and possibly amended.

A Few Steps Left

There are still a few regulatory hurdles in the way of full legalization of sports betting in Washington. Firstly, Gov. Jay Inslee’s signature will be required on the updated compacts - he has already signaled a willingness to adopt a robust legal sport betting platform, so this procedure is seen as a formality.

The Tribal Chair in Washington still has to sign off on the compact amendments and the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) still has to officially approve the language set out in the updated compact between the tribes and the Washington State legislature.

A draft set of the rules still has to be published and public consultation on the plans still has to be considered. The release of the draft is expected to happen July 7, and July 28 is the expected date of completion for all of the draft copy steps before the impending platform launch.

From what we have seen in other states hoping to bring in their own legal sports betting platforms lately, all of these procedural moves seem to be a foregone conclusion.

The When's, After the What's

With all of the procedural steps seemingly taking care of themselves, the question as to when Washington bettors will actually see the launch of a legal sports betting platform in their state is coming to light.

The U.S. Department of the Interior has 45 days to approve the compacts, although they have been much quicker than that in other prospective jurisdictions such as Arizona. The public consultation phase ends July 28.

That puts Washington on track to have their legal sports betting scene up and running by the start of the NFL season - September 9 to be exact. The heavy lifting is done for Washington State regulators. Finalizing is the quick and easy part!