Photo by Joel Kramer via Flickr creative commons
A high-profile push by the gaming empire Las Vegas Sands to bring casinos to Texas appears doomed at the state Capitol as this year’s legislative session begins to wind down.
Monday was the deadline for House committees to advance that chamber’s bills and joint resolutions, and the deadline passed without the State Affairs Committee voting out the Las Vegas Sands-backed House Joint Resolution 133. The legislation, which got a hearing last month, would let Texas voters decide whether to build “destination resorts” with casinos in the state’s four biggest metropolitan areas.
Identical legislation in the Senate has not even received a committee hearing, though its chances there were always slimmer given the resistance of the presiding officer, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.
“We have said from the beginning that we’re committed to Texas for the long haul,” Andy Abboud, Las Vegas Sands’ senior vice president of government relations, said in a statement given to The Texas Tribune on Monday evening. “We have made great strides this session and have enjoyed meeting with lawmakers about our vision for destination resorts and answering all the questions they have.”
Abboud added that the feedback has been “overwhelmingly positive,” promising the company “will continue to build on this progress over the final days of the legislation session, and over the coming months, we will continue to build community support across the state to ultimately turn this vision into a reality.”
See here and here for the background. Similar bills to allow betting on sports, which is now a thing that can happen, are also dead. (Yes, yes, I know, nothing is All Dead in the Legislature until sine die, but trust me – there’s no Miracle Max chocolate-coated pill for these bills.)
I’ve been following legislative sessions for almost 20 years now, and I’m pretty sure that in every one, we’ve had an organized and often highly publicized push for some form of gambling legalization. Horse racing, slot machines, poker, casinos, and now sports betting, every session without fail. Sometimes economic misfortune has been cited as a reason why This Time It’s Different, sometimes some other economic reason is given. Lamentations about people going to Louisiana or Oklahoma to get their gamble on are always a part of the ritual, as is the dredging up of a poll showing popular support for whatever form of gambling is being touted. We used to have a Republican Speaker whose family money came from horse racing. This time, we had an investment from Sheldon Adelson, gambling mogul and Republican super-duper-donor. Each was supposed to be a way to crack open the door. And without fail, every session it all ends with an unceremonious thud.
I am as you know ambivalent about expanded gambling. I don’t have any philosophical opposition to it, but I also don’t believe it to be all that good for the state, as it comes with a truckload of externalities. I do think that much like expanded access to marijuana, it’s coming to Texas sooner or later, if only because enough people want them. In both cases, the simple reason why these measures (the pro-pot ones are also highly touted and written about in breathless fashion) don’t get anywhere is that Dan Patrick opposes them. For reasons unclear to me, that usually merits little more than a one-paragraph acknowledgement towards the end of the stories. Dan Patrick won’t be in charge forever – if we’re lucky, this will be his last regular session to lord over – and that’s one reason why I expect things to eventually change. Until then, the smart money will always be to completely disregard the puff pieces about the hot new gambling advocacy alliance and bet on nothing happening. If there’d been a line on that and I’d been smart enough to play it I could put both my kids through college on that by now.
Instead of carving out an exception for 4 casinos to be built by one company, the only law that needs to be passed is, all forms of gambling are now legal in Texas and permits for those businesses will be shall issue, as long as whoever is getting the permit meets whatever requirements are set for any and all comers.