Delaware becomes first state to offer sports betting
Full-scale sports betting will begin next Tuesday at the state’s three casinos.
US.- Delaware will become the first state to offer full-scale sports betting in the United States after the Supreme Court declared that the federal ban was unconstitutional. Bets on sports will begin next Tuesday at 1:30 p.m. ET at the state’s three casinos.
The sports offerings will include single-game and championship wagering on professional football, hockey, baseball, soccer, golf, auto racing and basketball. Delawareans will be able to make legal sports bets on the NBA finals, which began yesterday night and could run through June 17th if the series makes it to a seventh game.
After the decision, Delaware Gov. John Carney said: “Delaware has all necessary legal and regulatory authority to move forward with a full-scale sports gaming operation, and we look forward to next week’s launch. We’re hopeful that this will bring even more visitors to Delaware to see firsthand what our state has to offer.”
The three casinos that will legally offer full-scale sports betting will be Delaware Park, Dover Downs Hotel & Casino and Harrington Raceway & Casino. While the state hasn’t announced if it will be able to offer college betting, it is believed that college football will be available. Current state lottery regulation establishes that no bets can be taken on Delaware’s two Division I colleges, Delaware State and the University of Delaware.
State Finance Secretary Rick Geisenberger said: ”Obviously the key is going to be the football season because the bulk of betting in America is on football. We’ll learn a little bit in June and July, but we’ll learn a lot more in September.”
Thanks to a failed sports lottery regulation from 1976, Delaware was one of the four states, along with Nevada, Oregon and Montana, that received permission to operate some type of sports betting, getting exemptions from the 1992 federal ban on sports betting that was recently overruled by the Supreme Court.
”We’ve had sport betting for nine years, so it’s not new to us,” state lottery director Vernon Kirk said on Thursday after officials completed live testing on the new system. We’re not surprised the software works because it’s been working fine,” Kirk said. ”We didn’t have to make any significant changes.” The official said that they are working on a mobile application that will eventually allow someone who is geolocated or physically present in the state, to place bets on a smartphone.
