By Jeremy Duda | Arizona Mirror
Football fans looking to place legal bets on their favorite teams when the NFL season starts next month will be out of luck if a pair of recently filed lawsuits succeed in stopping Arizona’s new sports betting law.
Two entities that aren’t eligible to allow sports betting under a law that Gov. Doug Ducey signed earlier this year — the Yavapai-Prescott Indian Tribe and Turf Paradise race track — are asking the courts to put the law on hold, which would upend plans to begin legal sports betting on Sept. 9, when the 2021 football season starts. A provision of the law allowing gambling on fantasy sports goes into effect on Aug. 28.
The Yavapai-Prescott tribe argues in its lawsuit that the sports wagering bill violates the Voter Protection Act, a provision of the Arizona Constitution which severely restricts the legislature’s ability to alter voter-approved laws, because it flies in the face of the 2002 ballot measure that permitted tribes to offer casino-style gaming.
The lawsuit argues that the sports wagering law violates the Voter Protection Act in two ways — by impermissibly expanding who can offer gaming and by expanding the types of gaming permitted by Prop. 202. Attorney Luis Ochoa of the law firm Quarles and Brady, who is representing the tribe, also noted that the new law permits non-tribal entities to offer keno, which was only permitted to Indian tribes by Prop. 202.
Jordan Rose, founder and president of Rose Law Group, who represents the PGA TOUR in their sportsbook says, “It seems like the issues raised in the litigation were contemplated and addressed in the state law, so hopefully this can be resolved quickly.”
