JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – Missouri voters narrowly approved Amendment 2, legalizing sports betting under the state’s constitution, according to unofficial election results from the Missouri Secretary of State’s website.
The amendment allows the Missouri Gaming Commission to regulate sports betting and license it through Missouri casinos, online sports platforms (i.e. FanDuel and DraftKings), or professional sports teams (i.e. St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Chiefs).
Although sports betting gained traction as one of the state’s most popular voting items this fall, preliminary results reveal a tight path to passing it with a margin of less than 7,000 votes between approval and rejection.
With Amendment 2 passing, how soon might you be able to participate in sports gambling in Missouri?
According to the amendment’s language, via the Missouri Secretary of State’s website, the amendment directs the Missouri Gaming Commission to make sports betting available in the state by Dec. 1, 2025.
In Missouri, once a voter-approved amendment passes, it takes 30 days after the election to become effective in the state constitution.
This means, without setbacks or legal challenges, people could place their first sports bets in Missouri sometime between Dec. 5, 2024, and Dec. 1, 2025, or sometime between the date when the amendment is set to be enshrined in the constitution and when the amendment lists a deadline to begin sports wagering.
However, several factors could influence the timetable for sports betting officially beginning legally in Missouri. That includes, but isn’t limited to, how soon the Missouri Gaming Commission establishes regulations for sports betting, issues licenses, and finalizes operational guidelines for casinos, platforms, and professional sports teams that intend to offer sports betting opportunities.
Lawsuits or other legal challenges remain a possibility after Amendment 2 narrowly passed. As recently as last summer, opponents moved forward with a legal effort to invalidate an initiative petition for sports betting. A judge rejected that effort in September, ruling that the decision would be left up to Missouri voters.
With the amendment’s slim margin of victory, it’s not out of question that some industry stakeholders or advocacy groups may attempt to challenge the constitutionality of sports betting in Missouri or specific provisions on how revenues from sports betting will be allocated.
For instance, the amendment language enables a 10% wagering tax on “adjusted gross revenue” from sports wagering and calls to appropriate “annual revenues received from such tax: for public education. Previously, groups like Missourians Against the Deceptive Online Gambling Amendment have argued that the measure made false claims about the amount of tax revenue that will be generated back to support Missouri schools.
Timelines for potential legal challenges, which could delay the start of sports betting in Missouri, are currently unclear.
As for possible timelines on placing sports bets, upon the action of it becoming legalized, neighboring state Kansas offers at least one perspective for comparison. Their governor, Laura Kelly, signed a bill into law on May 12, 2022, to legalize sports betting in the state. She then placed the state’s first legal sports bet on Sept. 1, 2022.
That proved to be a timeline of nearly four months from legalizing sports betting in Kansas to placing a legal sports bet, representing various regulatory and logistical steps necessary to launch sports betting in the state for good.
If this timeline proves similar for Missouri, it could be challenging for residents to place legal sports bets in time for Super Bowl LIX, one of the most popular American professional sporting events, which is set for Feb. 9, 2025. If Missouri had a similar timeline to Kansas, legalized sports betting could be ready shortly into the MLB season.
With the preliminary passage of Amendment 2, Missouri is on track to become the 39th state to legalize sports wagering in the United States.