More than six years into the Wild West days of legalized sports betting, Congress is getting involved. Sort of. But not much.
In a largely worthless exercise, given the looming shift in both houses of the legislature, the Senate Judiciary Committee conducted on Tuesday a public hearing on sports betting.
I watched all of it, so you didn’t have to. And be glad you didn’t have to.
I guess they meant well. It just didn’t shed any real light on anything we didn’t already know. Yes, the system is rigged so that the house always wins. Yes, there’s a need for some sort of federal regulation aimed at protecting consumers. But it seems as if Congress has no idea where to even get started.
Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) suggested forming a commission that would study the issue for a year and propose federal rules applicable to the states that have legalized sports betting. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) mentioned that she and Senator Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) recently sent a letter to the Department of Justice regarding match-fixing.
Frankly, sports betting presents a wide variety of complicated issues at both the college and pro level. Tuesday’s hearing, which included testimony from NCAA president Charlie Baker, focused heavily on college sports — including certain politically divisive elements of college sports entirely irrelevant to sports betting.
For anyone who follows the issue and understands the potential problems it can create, there was no new ground plowed. Congress needs to do a deep dive into all aspects of the industry. Especially since (as one witness said) the prevalence of gambling ads — including sports book commercials embedded in pregame shows that masquerade as actual content — normalize sports betting for millions of kids who grow up consuming NFL content and assuming that placing a prop bet is no more unusual than taking a timeout.
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