Christie urges states to resist federal control of sports betting

The former governor of New Jersey has urged lawmakers to work against a bill that would set a federal regulation.

US.- Chris Christie, former governor of New Jersey, is urging lawmakers across the country to work against a bill that would give the federal government the power to control regulations on sports betting. PASPA, the federal Act that prevented states from offering the gambling modality, was struck down by the Supreme Court last year.

The politician said on Friday that states have already proven that they can take care of their own regulations, without the need of the federal government being involved in the process. Christie started a court battle against the biggest sports leagues in the country that ended up with the Supreme Court ruling that states could choose whether or not they wanted to offer sports betting.

Christie talked in the National Council of Legislators from Gaming States conference and urged lawmakers to resist “integrity fees” as he said they should reject demands to use official league data in sports betting. He considers that doing so would be rewarding the leagues after their bad behavior in previous years, when they opposed sports betting. “We’re going to reward the people who fought us for seven years with fees that are going to diminish your margins?” Christie asked the lawmakers. “They don’t need it, and given their conduct over the last seven years, they don’t deserve it.”

“We do not need a federal solution to this problem,” Christie said. “States have been regulating gambling for decades without incident,” he added, in reference to the bill introduced last month by Senator Schumer and Senator Hatch that would grant the federal government control of sports betting. Christie called that bill “a solution in search of a problem.”