With New Jersey’s iGaming market coming out strong—touting the largest monthly GGR figures on record since the launch of online casinos in the Garden State— and nationwide gross gambling revenue for 2024 set to surpass US$70 billion (£52.7bn), it’s as good a time as any to examine the three U.S. states everybody’s talking about and assess how likely they are to pass new gambling reforms in 2025.

Ohio’s Bid For Online Casino

Ohio has come out early, before the start of most legislative sessions in the U.S., with Senator Niraj Antani introducing SB 312.

The partisan bill seeks to legalise online casinos and iLottery in Ohio. If it passes, the state will become the U.S.’s eighth online casino jurisdiction in the U.S.

SB 312 proposes expanding the current land-based casino industry to include online gaming. Each of the state’s retail casinos would be allowed one or more skins and pay a 15 percent tax on gross gaming receipts.

The bill would also open the way for Ohio to join the Multi-State Internet Gaming Agreement, which allows Delaware, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey and West Virginia to offer pooled prizes across poker games.

iGaming Net Benefit

Ohio’s casino bill comes off the back of an in-depth study conducted by special legislative committee, which concluded that “iLottery and iGaming could be a net benefit to the state of Ohio”.

The study addressed concerns regarding land-based casino cannibalisation—one of the biggest sticking points of the expansion of U.S. iGaming— and based its conclusion on what had occurred in other U.S. that had legalised iGaming and iLottery – all of which saw consistent increases in physical sales rather than decreases.

Will SB 312 Make It?

While there’s clear economic incentive, Ohio’s current Governor, Republican Mark DeWine, is traditionally anti-gambling and has been busy shoring up regulations and doubling the state’s online sports betting tax rate from 10 up to 20 percent, which suggests his focus is not on generating state funds from legalising online casinos.

Senator Antani’s term ends at the start of 2025, and he’s not planning to seek reelection, which puts a hard and fast deadline on the bill and means it’s now or never for Antani to make his mark on Ohio’s gambling industry.

SB 319 was filed on September 4 and has yet to be assigned to a committee. While there is opposition to iGaming from Ohio’s land-based industry, with no other state considering legalising iGaming, Ohio is 2025’s hottest prospect.

Missouri – Betting On the Ballot

Missouri is the most likely state to pass sports betting legislation in 2025. The issue is already set to appear on the November 2024 ballot, so the future of sports betting is in the hands of the public — regulating sports betting would require a constitutional amendment, so it must pass a public vote.

Recent public opinion polls have varied wildly—some reflect a split vote, others a clear preference for or against sports betting—so the vote could go either way.

One thing is sure: With FanDuel, DraftKings and Missouri’s sports leagues and casinos supporting the measure, we will likely see significant lobbying efforts in the next two months, which could sway public opinion in favour.

Should voters approve sports betting, the constitutional amendment would allow the Missouri Gambling Commission to licence entities—Missouri currently has 13 land-based casinos—to offer retail and online sports betting by December 2025.

Licensees would pay a 10 percent tax on revenues, which would go directly to the state’s education fund and the Compulsive Gambling Prevention Fund.

Texas – Land-Based Casinos Coming Soon?

There are not many states left with zero forms of legal gambling, but as one of the last American outposts with almost no forms (the state Constitution bans gambling outside of tribal casinos, pari-mutuel racing, and the lottery), Texas is ripe for casino reform, but as with previous attempts, the Senate may still not be game.

Texas’s legislature meets every other year. And with commercial casino and sports betting bills failing to pass in 2023, everyone expects 2025 to be the year Texas lawmakers may finally make space on the agenda for casino resorts.

Public opinion polls conducted in April found that 56 percent of Texans support legalising casino resorts.

Moreover, approximately “three-fifths of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents support Destination Resort Casinos, while less than one-third oppose” them.

With public and political forces lining up, it seems the landscape is prime for gambling reform. However, the odds are still long, and the issue lies with the Texas Senate, presided over by the Lieutenant Governor of Texas, Dan Patrick.

Patrick said in 2023 that there were not enough votes in the Senate to support casino reform, which stalled all progress.

This has led pro-gambling Texas Representative Jeff Leach to suggest that gambling expansion will not move forward until the state Senate indicates its support.

Gambling expansion in the Lone Star State requires a constitutional amendment, which must be supported by at least two-thirds of the House and Senate – and approved by a majority of voters.

As in previous legislative sessions, powerful casino-backed lobbying efforts are likely to be unleashed in Texas. But whether they’ll be able to swing the Senate is open to question.

Watch this space!