LEXINGTON, KY – The Family Foundation said on the eve of the Super Bowl that it thought that if the sports wagering bill gambling proponents say they are going to introduce into the Kentucky General Assembly is similar to their 2020 bill, it will be “dead on arrival.” “We don’t sense any desire on the part of state lawmakers to expand gambling in this state two years in a row,” said Martin Cothran, spokesman for the group.
“We don’t think a sports betting bill will even make it through the first round of the legislative playoffs, much less pass both chambers of the legislature. There is just no sentiment for getting into another ugly and divisive fight on gambling just a year after historic horse racing slot machines only barely made it through.”
“It’ll take a hail Mary for this bill to even reach a vote in either chamber,” he said.
The Family Foundation has opposed past sports wagering bills because sports wagering is not constitutional in Kentucky and because of the social harms to Kentucky families caused by the predatory gambling industry. “The sponsors of these bills keep ignoring constitutional restrictions on gambling and trying to pass a regular statutory law. That’s not going to fly.”
Cothran also said that government promoted sports wagering will only further impoverish Kentucky’s poor by taking money from the hands of Kentucky families and shifting it to the gambling industry.
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The Family Foundation is a Kentucky nonprofit organization that stands for Kentucky families and the Biblical values that make them strong. Learn more at kentuckyfamily.org.
