Colorado Legalizes Sports Betting After Residents Vote Very Tightly in Favor

On Wednesday, voters in Colorado have given a decisive budge to sports betting legislation in this state, making it the 19th US jurisdiction that has legalized this betting branch.

Regulated sports betting in Colorado is expected to begin in May next year.

A Very Close Call

State legislature has shown for the so-called Proposition DD…

…but it also had to be approved by residents of Colorado before becoming enforced. The state of 5.69 million people had over 1.4 million of them cast their vote on the matter during voting day on November 6th.

It was a very unpredictable day for the sports betting legislation, as throughout the whole voting process it was bouncing between winning and losing. Although it was always going to be a close call, the legislation kept swinging and eventually came out a winner by a 22,000-ballot lead by the end of the vote.

This happened despite the fact that most of state’s 64 counties declined the proposal of sports betting. It did gain enough from the most populous areas of Colorado, such as Denver, Adams, Arapahoe, Douglas and Jefferson County.

Colorado’s historically republican areas did not the measure, and neither did Pueblo and La Plata counties.

A Confusing Language?

Even though the sports betting win came as a surprise…

…many thing it was Proposition DD’s confusing language that confused many of the voters (a lot of them simply left the answering field blank).

The prospect of sports betting had a “turn off” effect to both the republican and democrat voters: the latter are concerned about the tax increase, while democrats are worried about the negative impact sports betting could have on the vulnerable population.

Chris Hubbard, spokesman for the group that ed Proposition DD, said of this:

“In of the ballot language, it was important that we communicated from the outset who was paying the tax and what it was going to fund. We’ve put a down payment on Colorado’s water plan and those conversations can begin to move forward in a real way.”

The US states that already have sports betting legalized are: New Jersey, Indiana, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Washington DC.

Source:

“Colorado voters narrowly approve sports betting, turning on new spigot for water project funding”, Jesse Paul, coloradosun.com, November 6, 2019.