Illinois Online Sports Betting Signup Is Back

From The Center Square:

By Cole Lauterbach

Gov. J.B. Pritzker has rescinded a requirement widely-criticized as a deal cut with a Chicago-area casino that required anyone hoping to place online bets for sporting events to register in person at a casino.

The move is projected to bring the state millions of dollars per month in additional revenue.

Pritzker’s executive order signed Friday not only re-extended his ongoing emergency COVID-19 restrictions but it also removed the in-person requirement to register for popular online betting sites like FanDuel or DraftKings.

“If you’re in Chicago and you want to use DraftKings’ sportsbook, you would have had to drive to East St. Louis to sign up,” said Jeremy Kudon, partner at Orrick, Harrington, and Sutcliffe. Kudon worked on behalf of DraftKings to make the service available in Illinois. “Now you can do it on your phone, which is the way most states do mobile sports betting.

FanDuel and DraftKings account for about three-quarters of the legal online betting business in the United States, Kudon said. He estimates that the state will bring in between $8-10 million monthly in tax revenue.

Online outlets and others were taking shots at Rivers Casino, a major political player in Illinois and Chicago, for working out a compromise with lawmakers that imposed the one-year ban on mobile registration. In a now-deleted tweet, DraftKings CEO Jason Robins called the owners of Rush Street Gaming “corrupt idiots” for trying to block them in the state.

“The casino that lobbied for in-person registration was Rivers Casino, who’s based right by the [O’Hare International] airport,” Kudon said. “I think that they saw a benefit in having people have to sign up at their casino rather than sign up online because then they knew that people might sign up for DraftKings or FanDuel.”

Pritzker legalized sports betting in 2019, well after neighboring Indiana and other states had done so following a U.S. Supreme Court decision struck down bans on sports wagering.

Pritzker’s executive order allowing for online registration expires on Sept. 19.

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