Prior to the Supreme Court’s landmark decision to legalize sports betting, the New Jersey argument that NJ sports betting was safe had a flaw.
The state claimed legal sports betting does not pose an integrity threat to sports teams, yet chose to exempt NJ colleges and universities from the games being offered to bettors by bookmakers.
It is perhaps facile to argue that there is not an integrity threat and that if there is, it is confined within the territorial boundaries of New Jersey. But the plaintiff sports leagues did not really hammer away at this mistake.
The idea that match-fixers are able to travel by any known mode of interstate transportation seemed to be problematic to the New Jersey decision
What does this mean for sports betting?
What New Jersey has done is favor in-state teams over out-of-state teams. The question that a court will ask is whether there is a justification for favoring New Jersey college teams over teams outside of the state.
Any argument in favor of a need to protect NJ teams on the basis of integrity would seem to fall apart when minutes away by car, New Jersey residents can be in Philadelphia wagering at Pennsylvania-based sportsbooks on not only Rutgers games, but also on Villanova games.
But New Jersey teams seem to have a need for protection not felt in other jurisdictions, at least according to the 2018 New Jersey law. The exemption of in-state teams is bad for integrity as it confines money being bet on those teams primarily to the illegal market (or out-of-state), but it is also likely unconstitutional favoritism.
All or nothing?
There is either a justification for a total collegiate ban or no ban at all. If sports betting is interstate commerce, which the Supreme Court concluded it was, it is difficult for any argument to be advanced that exempting betting on New Jersey-based teams while allowing betting on out-of-state collegiate teams is not disparate treatment, which violates the dormant commerce clause.
Of course, New Jersey’s regulations might violate the Dormant Commerce Clause, but until someone challenges the statute, it is unlikely any change will come. However, when the time does come, the litigation is likely to deplete the state’s gains that it has made through taxing betting on out-of-state contests.
Making the case that New Jersey and any others considering exempting in-state colleges reverse such regulations prior to an expensive, drawn-out legal challenge.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.legalsportsreport.com/32820/in-state-nj-sports-betting/amp/
The state claimed legal sports betting does not pose an integrity threat to sports teams, yet chose to exempt NJ colleges and universities from the games being offered to bettors by bookmakers.
It is perhaps facile to argue that there is not an integrity threat and that if there is, it is confined within the territorial boundaries of New Jersey. But the plaintiff sports leagues did not really hammer away at this mistake.
The idea that match-fixers are able to travel by any known mode of interstate transportation seemed to be problematic to the New Jersey decision
What does this mean for sports betting?
What New Jersey has done is favor in-state teams over out-of-state teams. The question that a court will ask is whether there is a justification for favoring New Jersey college teams over teams outside of the state.
Any argument in favor of a need to protect NJ teams on the basis of integrity would seem to fall apart when minutes away by car, New Jersey residents can be in Philadelphia wagering at Pennsylvania-based sportsbooks on not only Rutgers games, but also on Villanova games.
But New Jersey teams seem to have a need for protection not felt in other jurisdictions, at least according to the 2018 New Jersey law. The exemption of in-state teams is bad for integrity as it confines money being bet on those teams primarily to the illegal market (or out-of-state), but it is also likely unconstitutional favoritism.
All or nothing?
There is either a justification for a total collegiate ban or no ban at all. If sports betting is interstate commerce, which the Supreme Court concluded it was, it is difficult for any argument to be advanced that exempting betting on New Jersey-based teams while allowing betting on out-of-state collegiate teams is not disparate treatment, which violates the dormant commerce clause.
Of course, New Jersey’s regulations might violate the Dormant Commerce Clause, but until someone challenges the statute, it is unlikely any change will come. However, when the time does come, the litigation is likely to deplete the state’s gains that it has made through taxing betting on out-of-state contests.
Making the case that New Jersey and any others considering exempting in-state colleges reverse such regulations prior to an expensive, drawn-out legal challenge.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.legalsportsreport.com/32820/in-state-nj-sports-betting/amp/
