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May 16, 2018 The Skanner Page 9 News Lay Your Money Down: Court Says States Can OK Sports Betting By Jessica Gresko and Wayne Parry Associated Press WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for states coast to coast to le- galize betting on sports, breaking a longtime ban and creating a potential financial boon for states and the gambling indus- try. The first bets could be placed within weeks. Despite opposition from the major sports leagues and the Trump administration, the high court struck down a fed- eral law that had barred betting on football, bas- ketball, baseball and oth- er sports in most states. States that want to take advantage of the ruling now will generally have to pass legislation to al- low sports books to open. Some, including New Jersey, which brought the case to the Supreme Court, have a head start. Sports leagues had ex- pressed concerns about any expansion of sports gambling. Their huge businesses could be badly harmed if people thought the outcome of games could be altered by someone who had wa- gered money on a certain result. However, the ruling ICE cont’d from pg 8 ICE’s acting director, pledged to increase workplace enforcement by “four or five times,” opening a new front in an immigration crack- down that includes a 40 percent increase in de- portation arrests and initial funding for a bor- der wall with Mexico. In April, ICE agents made 97 arrests at a meatpack- ing plant in rural Ten- nessee with a helicopter flying above, reminis- cent of the high-profile shows of force that were common during Presi- dent George W. Bush’s administration. Benner said the agency will focus both on crim- inal cases against em- ployers as well deporting employees who in the country illegally. Illegal hiring creates unfair ad- vantages for companies, encourages people to come to the U.S. illegally, results in document and identity fraud and expos- es workers to potentially dangerous conditions without overtime pay or health insurance, he said. also could be seen as merely bringing an ac- tivity out of the shadows that many people already see as a mainstream hob- by. Americans wager about $150 billion on sports each year illegally, according to the Amer- ican Gaming Associa- tion. The law the justices struck down forbade state-authorized sports gambling with some ex- ceptions and made Neva- da the only state where a person could wager on the results of a single game. “ The legal- ization of sports gambling requires an import- ant policy choice, but the choice is not ours to make Stock prices for casi- no operators and equip- ment makers surged after the ruling was an- nounced. Gambling on sports could quickly become widely available, with It remains to be seen whether immigration authorities can perform enough audits to compel a similar degree of com- pliance that the Internal Revenue Service does on personal and corporate tax returns. One mea- sure may be the number of employees who volun- tarily enroll in the feder- al government’s E-Verify system to electronically confirm if a person is au- thorized to work in the U.S. Mark Krikorian, ex- ecutive director of the Center for Immigration Studies and an advocate for an employer crack- down, said the numbers show that the administra- tion is following through on its pledge to scruti- nize businesses but that it could take a while for a “culture of compliance” to take hold. “My hope is we’re going to see some employers perp-walked, but that’s harder than it sounds,” he said. “It’s hard to get the suits at a company ... They will have told low- er-level managers what to do with a wink and a nod and there’s no record of it.” one research firm es- timating that 32 states would likely offer sports betting within five years. The ruling “opens up the floodgates” for sports gambling in any state that wants to have it, said Daniel Wallach, a sports law expert in Florida. The decision had been eagerly anticipated by gamblers and also states that hope their cut of le- galized sports betting can help solve budget problems. States that have already laid the le- gal groundwork include New Jersey, where one racetrack said it would begin taking bets within two weeks. Mississippi and West Virginia have also been preparing for sports betting, and gam- blers there could be plac- ing bets as early as this summer and certainly before the NFL season starts in September. Delaware, too, could quickly expand beyond certain bets currently of- fered at its casinos. Penn- sylvania and New York have also made moves to begin sports gam- bling. However, other states that want to allow sports betting could still see several Super Bowls come and go before peo- ple there can place a legal bet close to home. The Trump adminis- tration had urged the high court to uphold the law, surprising perhaps because the president AP PHOTO/SETH WENIG Experts say Americans already wager about $150 billion on sports each year, but new ruling could ‘open floodgates’ for legal gambling businesses Monmouth Park racetrack is seen from a box in Oceanport, N.J., Monday, May 14, 2018. The Supreme Court on Monday gave its go-ahead for states to allow gambling on sports across the nation, striking down a federal law that barred betting on football, basketball, baseball and other sports in most states. Monmouth Park has already set up a sports book operation and has previously estimated it could take bets within two weeks of a favorable Supreme Court ruling. is the former owner of a New Jersey casino, the Trump Taj Mahal, now being remade into a Hard Rock casino resort. All four major U.S. profes- sional sports leagues and the NCAA also had urged the court to uphold the federal law, saying a gam- bling expansion would hurt the integrity of their games. They also said that with legal sports bet- ting in the United States, they’d have to spend a lot more money monitoring betting patterns and in- vestigating suspicious activity. Sports gambling pro- ponents argued that the leagues already do that work and that legal sports betting will make enforcement easier than it is now, when most bets in the U.S. are made illegally. They say state regulators are capable of monitoring suspicious bets, as is done in Neva- da. On Monday, NBA com- missioner Adam Silver and Major League Base- ball issued statements saying the “integrity” of their games would remain a priority. Rep- resentatives of the Na- tional Hockey League, National Football League and NCAA said they were reviewing the court’s de- cision. Some saw other con- cerns, including for some gamblers. The rul- ing “will likely increase gambling participation and gambling problems unless steps are taken to minimize harm,” said Marlene Warner, the president of the Nation- al Council on Problem Gambling’s board of di- rectors. The council said any government body or sports league that re- ceives a direct percent- age or portion of sports betting revenue should dedicate some of it to treat gambling problems. The law the justices struck down was passed by Congress in 1992 and called the Professional See BETTING on page 10
