After a close race leading into Wednesday morning, Missouri is now the 39th state to legalize sports betting.
Missouri residents no longer have to travel across state lines to place their bets and the state could look to see multiple revenue streams from this amendment.
Jack Cardetti, spokesman for the Winning for Missouri Education, says the ‘Yes’ vote comes from the credibility of the sports teams in the state.
“Right now, Missourians are already doing this but we’re not getting any benefit from it, and I think that was a key message and a key reason this actually passed,” Cardetti said.
The measure to legalize sports betting in the State of Missouri barely passed with a 50.1% YES vote and a 49% NO vote according to the Associated Press.
According to the ballot language, sports betting will be available in the state by December 1, but the Missouri Gaming Commission has until December 1, 2025, to be fully operational.
Jan Zimmerman, the chairman of the Missouri Gaming Commission, says the commission is optimistic in getting everything up and running on a hard deadline.
“We’re optimistic, maybe mid to late summer before we go through all of those administrative processes and of course everything has to go through the governor for approval,” Zimmerman said. “Just from an administrative standpoint, we have a lot of work to do before we could ever go live.”
Zimmerman also stated, that being the 39th state to legalize has its advantages because they can communicate with other states to see what has worked and what has not.
According to Missouri Law, when an amendment is passed, it has 30 days to take effect.