As Republican and Democrat legislators prepare to—again—align themselves on both sides of the sports betting issue, Minnesota’s Catholic bishops wrote Gov. Tim Walz earlier this month urging him to oppose gambling expansion.
The Minnesota Catholic Conference is the public policy arm of the six dioceses across Minnesota and has a steady presence at the Capitol during the legislative session. It represents the views of the bishops who lead the Catholic Church in those regions of the state.
“We write … to implore you to not waste time with harmful proposals to expand gambling in Minnesota, particularly in the form of online sports betting platforms,” the MCC said in its Jan. 14 letter to Walz.
Chief among the bishops’ concerns is the language of last year’s gambling expansion bill—that almost made it to the House and Senate floors—that would legalize sports betting on mobile phones.
“Putting a sports bookie in everyone’s pocket via their cell phone is a very bad idea,” said Jason Adkins, executive director of the MCC. “This is not harmless recreation. Giving people 24/7 access to sports gambling allows an industry to prey upon those prone to addiction and encourages others to chase their losses.”
In their letter to Walz, the bishops also stressed that the financial costs to Minnesota families “could be severe.”
“Legalization of sports betting has been estimated to increase the risk of bankruptcy by 25 to 30 percent,” the bishops wrote. “And according to scholars at Northeastern University, for every dollar spent on sports gambling, households put two fewer dollars into investment accounts.”
In the final hours of session last May, proponents of the bill said they were as close as they’ve been in recent years to passing the legislation on the floor. But a bipartisan coalition of state senators—which included Sen. John Marty, DFL-Roseville, and Sen. Jordan Rasmusson, R-Fergus Falls—took credit for blocking its passage.
Earlier in the session Rasmusson was able to garner enough support to amend the bill in the Commerce Committee to ban in-game betting. The bill moved through several committees in the legislature, but stopped short of advancing to either the House or Senate floors, even as it garnered bipartisan support.
Rep. Zack Stephenson, DFL-Coon Rapids, was the chief author of the bill in the House, but he was able to get Rep. Elliott Engen, R-White Bear Township, to sign on as a co-sponsor. Other Republicans, including recently retired Pat Garofalo, have long advocated for the legalization of sports betting.
In the Senate, Matt Klein, DFL-Mendota Heights, carried the bill. While no Senate Republicans signed on as co-sponsors, a handful of Republicans, including Sen. Jeremy Miller of Winona, expressed support for some form of sports gambling.
Legislators in the House and Senate have yet to formally introduce a sports betting bill this session, but a bipartisan group in both chambers has indicated they plan to push for its advancement in the coming weeks.
Last week, Miller announced he will introduce an updated iteration of a bill he carried last year that he says “builds on the bipartisan cooperation and momentum from last session and aims to bring together stakeholders and legislators from both sides of the aisle to legalize sports betting in Minnesota.”
“This updated proposal combines ideas from the last two versions of my Minnesota Sports Betting Act along with proposals from other sports betting bills that have made progress in the legislature,” Miller said on Thursday.
The ball on sports betting began rolling almost seven years ago after a United States Supreme Court ruling struck down a 1992 federal law that effectively banned most states from authorizing commercial sports gambling. Sports wagering has been rapidly gaining acceptance in America ever since. At present, 39 states and Washington, D.C. have legalized sports betting since the 2018 federal Supreme Court ruling.
Hank Long
Hank Long is a journalism and communications professional whose writing career includes coverage of the Minnesota legislature, city and county governments and the commercial real estate industry. Hank received his undergraduate degree at the University of Minnesota, where he studied journalism, and his law degree at the University of St. Thomas. The Minnesota native lives in the Twin Cities with his wife and four children. His dream is to be around when the Vikings win the Super Bowl.
