New Florida Sports Betting Bill Increasing Penalties for Gambling with Inside Info

A new Florida sports betting bill seeks to make gambling on games using inside information a felony.

Representative Webster Barnaby, a House Republican, is the primary sponsor of the initiative. Senator Corey Simon, a former NFL player, also filed Senate Bill 1404 (SB 1404). Both initiatives are similar in nature.

Among other things, Barnaby’s proposal, House Bill 953 (HB 953), makes “betting on athletic contests with knowledge that the results are prearranged or predetermined” a felony offense. 

Currently, this type of wagering exists in a legal gray area. To be sure, bookmaking rings that traffic in predetermined outcomes of events are illegal. But the process by which they are charged lacks concreteness. Those in charge often face the fullest extent of the law. Participants in such schemes, though, aren’t necessarily beholden to any legal rubric. There are a lot of interpretative machinations at play.

As such, if approved, HB 953 may represent a landmark moment for sports betting in Florida. Really, it may be a legislative touchstone for the entire industry. Sports betting in the United States is seemingly embroiled in more frequent insider-gambling scandals each year. Legislation of this kind seems like the natural next step.

Granted, increasing penalties for insider betting will not eradicate altogether. But if nothing else, it certainly makes it more prohibitive. Of course, this all presumes HB 953—and other measures like it—are approved by congress. 

Full Details on New Florida Sports Betting Bill 

Geoff Zochodne of Covers highlights the most important factors from the new Florida sports betting bill: 

“For example, the legislation would make it a third-degree felony for anyone to wager with intel about the fix being in, such as a heads-up about someone planning to throw a game or shave points…Both bills would also make it a crime for someone to play in online casinos or use online sportsbooks that are not the property of the state's Seminole Tribe, which has exclusive rights to those types of offerings in Florida. Any iGaming or online sports betting play would be considered a first or second-degree misdemeanor. 

“The legislation would make it illegal to operate an online casino or online sportsbook in Florida as well, unless you're the Seminole Tribe. According to the bills, anyone who isn't the tribe would be guilty of a third-degree felony. Moreover, the language in the bills looks like it could apply to online sweepstakes casinos and sportsbooks, as it mentions the wagering with an “other thing of value,” not just money. Anti-sweepstakes legislation is being mulled over in other states, such as Mississippi.”

These initiatives may be responses to scandals that have accompanied legal sports betting in the United States. Insider gambling was always bound to be an issue as the industry matured. Especially when it comes to college sports betting. Even with the Naming Image and Likeness (NIL) policies, most student-athletes are not well compensated. This paves the way for predatory characters to exploit what people consider a fleeting window of earning potential. 

However, if you read closely enough, you can also see that this doubles as an attempt to solidify Seminole Tribe sports betting exclusivity. In fact, that may be the entire point of one or both of these initiatives.

New Gambling Bill Also Increases Fallout for Users of Non-Seminole Tribe Sportsbooks

House Bill 953 is not just taking aim at illegal bookmaking operations. It also spotlights individuals who use them. 

Consider this line from above: “Both bills would also make it a crime for someone to play in online casinos or use online sportsbooks that are not the property of the state's Seminole Tribe.” Now, it is currently a crime to bet on non-licensed bookies in Florida. But this part also appears to include offshore betting sites. So, any Floridian who is placing wagers with an international sportsbook would therefore be committing a crime.

To what end authorities might pursue these Florida sports betting violations is debatable. If successful, though, this bill increases the exclusivity held by the Seminole Tribe, further disincentivizing gamblers from using offshore bookies. 

This could also give the Seminole Tribe additional leverage when it comes to Florida sports betting expansion. Sure, to some extent, they already hold all the cards. The Sunshine State cannot broaden regulations to allow companies like FanDuel and DraftKings into the market without the Seminoles’ approval. But this bill will effectively increase their already-exclusive market share by virtue of deterring many from using offshore betting sites. And that subsequent uptick will be worth a boatload of money if and when they decide to broker partnerships with commercial sportsbooks.

Will House Bill 953 or Senate Bill 1404 Actually Pass?

As Zochodne notes in his summary, neither of these bills are especially likely to pass. The Florida state legislature has a full docket. Much of what’s on their agenda is considered higher priority.

Beyond that, elements of both proposals call for the type of regulation presently considered implausible. Other states have tried cracking down on offshore sports betting and casino penalties in the past. Those measures always seem to fall by the wayside. It takes too many resources to police an industry to which state and federal government branches have no claim. And even then, the end result is never complete and total shutdowns. There will always be transactions that fall through cracks. Stage legislators invariably come to believe that resources are better allocated toward more realistic goals.

Still, as the saying goes, “it only takes one.” And if one of these Florida sports betting bills ends up getting the green light, expect similar pieces of legislation to crop up across the rest of the country. 

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