New bill seeks to ban online gambling in Brazil barely a year after regulation
Pedro Uczai’s Bill PL-1808/2026 would ban all forms of online gambling, including sports betting.
Brazil.- A Workers’ Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores – PT) legislator has introduced Bill PL-1808/2026 in Congress, seeking the nationwide prohibition of all online gambling. The move comes little over a year after regulated online gambling began in Brazil.
The proposal, tabled by deputy Pedro Uczai goes further than President Lula da Silva’s call to ban online casino gaming in that it calls for the total repeal of PL 2626/2023, the so-called Bets Law that allowed the launch of regulated online gambling in Brazil on January 1, 2025. That would include sports betting.
The draft legislation states: “This Law prohibits, throughout the national territory, the exploitation, operation, offering, availability, promotion, advertising, intermediation and processing of transactions related to fixed-odds betting.”
Such a move would dismantle the entire framework for online gambling in Brazil, covering everything from platform operations to advertising, sponsorships, payment systems, and intermediary services. The bill proposes the removal of betting apps and websites within periods ranging from 15 to 60 days, the blocking of gambling-related financial transactions and strict penalties for operators, affiliates, and service providers who violate the law.
The bill reportedly has the backing of 68 PT lawmakers, who frame the measure as an urgent safeguard to protect public health and prevent economic harms. Uczai argued that the PT government had a duty to intervene due to “rising household debt, financial instability and mental health issues” linked to the expansion of online gambling.
However, president Lula da Silva has not publicly commented on the proposal, despite having expressed a desire to ban online casino gaming in Brazil during his campaigning ahead of the presidential election in October, when he will run for a fourth term. Lula was expected to push for an online casino ban and/or ad restrictions rather than a complete repeal of the Brazilian gambling legislation that he signed in December 2023.
Brazil’s federal tax agency, Receita Federal, has forecast R$13bn (€2.17bn) in revenue from gambling in 2026, funds that the government needs for its social programmes. The bill is also likely to face strong resistance from Brazilian football leagues and media outlets, which have become heavily dependent on betting sponsorships.
Just this week, the Federal District Football Federation (FFDF) and National Football Union (Sinafut) published a statement opposing bills already being processed in Congress that propose bans on gambling advertising. They say an ad ban would result in a “collapse of the economic and financial model of the entire Brazilian football ecosystem.”
Those bills include PSD federal deputy Saulo Pedroso’s Bill 1212/2025. PODE’s Rodrigo Gambele filed an urgent request last week to expedite the bill’s processing.
