Sports betting petitions still aren’t ready to circulate, Secretary of State records show

This story was updated at 3:57 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 5.

Nearly a month after they were submitted to the Nebraska Secretary of State’s Office, two petitions aiming to legalize online sports betting have not been finalized and are not circulating.

Lynne McNally is the CEO of the Nebraska Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association and director of government relations at WarHorse Casino. McNally told the Lincoln Journal Star in early January that WarHorse and the Sports Betting Alliance, which is a network of national sports betting companies, are supporting a new petition effort to legalize online sports betting.

But conversations about how that language will appear before potential petition signees remains up in the air. Nebraska Public Media News on Tuesday obtained copies of the stalled petitions from the Secretary of State’s Office. The initial filings show Kyle Adema, Jordan McGrain and Tim Moran – all from the Omaha area – are sponsoring the pair of petitions and filed paperwork with the office on Jan. 9. Those filers are associated with the Sports Betting Alliance, according to WarHorse officials.

One petition, initially labeled “Allow Online Sports Wagering for Property Tax Relief” seeks to amend the Nebraska Constitution to enact legislation that would allow sports wagers in Nebraska through an internet-based platform offered by an authorized gaming operator.

The other petition filed by the group, labeled “Property Tax Credit Fund Increase from Online Sports Wagering,” seeks to create a state law allowing sports wagers to be placed anywhere in the state through internet-based platforms offered by an authorized gaming operator or its contracted platform provider. The petition language says that any server hosting an online wagering platform would need to be physically located in the state.

The petition says gaming operators may “conduct sports wagering through no more than two online sports wagering platforms.”

WarHorse operates casinos in Lincoln and Omaha with plans to build another at the Atokad racetrack in South Sioux City. CEO Lance Morgan said the petition would allow WarHorse to partner with six digital betting companies, two per facility.

“Right now we have DraftKings, FanDuel, Bet MGM, Circa and Bet 365,” Morgan said. “We have room for one more partner, but we don't know who that's going to be just yet.”

With additional casinos operated by Harrah’s and Caesar’s Entertainment in Columbus and by Elite Casino Resorts in Grand Island and Ogallala, there could be up to 12 mobile sports wagering companies in Nebraska.

“And we think that's plenty for Nebraska,” Morgan said.

Revenue would be taxed at the same 20% rate as in-person casino wagers, McNally said. She said 70% of the tax revenue will go toward the property tax relief fund, which is the same as in-person wagering.

Under a constitutional amendment passed by voters in 2020, 2.5% of gaming taxes benefit the Compulsive Gamblers Assistance Fund.

But in Gov. Jim Pillen’s budget proposal, LB1072 would change the allocation to 1%.

On Thursday, Mike Sciandra with the Nebraska Council on Problem Gambling said that’s not enough money. He said mobile sports gambling is four times more addictive than other casino games.

“We need to be funding probable gambling treatment at a much higher level than that 2.5%,” Sciandra said. “I understand the reasoning for wanting to bring mobile sports betting to the state from a revenue standpoint, but we cannot ignore the social costs.”

The bill would also eliminate the Commission on Problem Gambling, which oversees all treatment in the state, and move those responsibilities under the Division of Behavioral Health at the state’s health department.

On Thursday, Pillen’s spokesperson Laura Strimple said in a written statement that moving the assistance program to Nebraska’s DHHS “best aligns the program with the specialized expertise needed to effectively address gambling addiction.

“In fact, this type of provider service is substantively similar to those already provided by some counselors in DHHS,” Strimple said. “The proposed movement of this program to DHHS ensures that gambling addiction is addressed as the health issue it is and allows services to be integrated with existing mental health and addiction support, which will allow for improved care, accountability, and outcomes for individuals and families who are affected.

On the tax allocation change, she said, “[t]he gaming tax allocation is realigned with the projected budget needs against the projected growth in gaming revenue.”

Under the petition, how local taxes get allocated would also change.

Taxes from in-person wagers are also allocated to the county and city where a casino is located. Under the current online betting petition, a percentage will be distributed to the county of the bettor’s location, McNally said.

“For the entire state to participate, that percentage of the money, instead of the city and county where the casino is, will go to the county where the person is located when they place the bet,” McNally said.

Betting apps determine location with real-time tracking software. Morgan said WarHorse’s sports gaming partners will likely build servers in the state, which will provide a small influx of jobs, he said.

If the petition reaches the general election ballot and voters approve of the measure, the language calls for the Nebraska Racing and Gaming Commission to develop and adopt regulations for sports wagering through an online sports wagering platform on or before June 1, 2027.

A spokesperson for the Secretary of State said on Wednesday afternoon the office received a second draft of the petition.

A petition attempting to amend the Nebraska Constitution would need valid signatures from at least 10% of people registered to vote in Nebraska, or about 125,000 voters. For the second petition that aims to create the state statute, organizers would need to collect valid signatures from just 7% of people registered to vote in Nebraska, or about 88,000 voters. Both petitions would need to collect valid signatures from at least 5% of the registered voters in at least 38 of Nebraska’s 93 counties.

Currently, all sports wagering must take place in person in one of the state’s five racetrack casinos. Some lawmakers and business leaders have argued the in-person limit is causing Nebraska to miss out on millions of dollars in bets placed in neighboring states like Iowa, where it’s legal to make an online sports bet anywhere in the state.

In testimony to the General Affairs Committee in 2024, a casino industry representative in Nebraska estimated the state is losing $30 million in annual tax revenue to states where online sports betting is legal. GeoComply, a software company that specializes in geolocation compliance, told the committee that between July 1, 2023, and June 30, 2024, it blocked 4.5 million attempts from Nebraskans trying to access legal mobile sportsbooks in other states.

Most users, 82%, according to GeoComply, were in or near the Omaha area and traveled across the Missouri River into Iowa to place online sports bets. Another 14% of users were in Nebraska and traveled to Colorado to place online wagers.

At the time of its analysis, the company identified 118,000 mobile sports betting user accounts in Nebraska, which was a 45% increase in mobile betting accounts in Nebraska compared to the previous year.

At least 31 states now permit mobile sports gambling. Voters in Missouri in 2024 narrowly elected to include their state in that list after lawmakers failed to pass legislation earlier that year to legalize mobile sports betting. Draftkings and FanDuel, two popular mobile sports betting companies that are a part of the Sports Betting Alliance, helped spend $43 million to get the Missouri petition on the ballot and through the finish line.

The groups are expected to put up a similar campaign if the petition clears the Secretary of State’s Office. When the last mobile sports betting proposal was introduced in the Legislature in 2025, it received initial support but was eventually pulled by lead sponsor Sen. Elliot Bostar after it was filibustered by other senators.

Gov. Jim Pillen has supported legalizing online sports betting in the past, saying it could generate revenue to offset the state’s reliance on property taxes. But opposing senators have called the proposal “taxation by exploitation.”

“We’re going to exploit people to get tax revenue out of them, mainly young men,” Sen. Jared Storm argued on the Legislature floor. “So you’re going to have students at UNL, students at UNK, other universities, who are going to gamble away their tuition on online sports betting. I think as state senators, we have to stand up for those people.”

Sciandra with the Council on Problem Gambling said education for young adults about online sports betting would need to increase if the petition passes.

“Those initiatives and those programs will continue, and hopefully I can expand more of those,” Sciandra said. “I will tell you that the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and other entities throughout the state — other colleges that I work with — are acutely aware of this and see this already as a problem.”

Excessive gambling will increase the more it gets normalized in the state, he said.

A last-ditch effort, in the form of a letter penned by former Husker football coach Tom Osborne, former Gov. Kay Orr, Sen. Pete Ricketts and State Auditor Mike Foley, helped sway the remaining on-the-fence senators and sink the measure.

The petition effort comes as casinos in Nebraska continue to rake in a record amount of money. Nebraska’s casinos topped off a strong 2025 with their best month on record for December, bringing in more than $26 million in revenue and more than $5 million in taxes for the first time ever.

According to the final tax and revenue report of 2025 from the Nebraska Racing and Gaming Commission, total revenue grew from about $145 million in 2024 to more than $261 million last year.

However, only about $9.3 million of that revenue came from sports betting, although that number was nearly double the sports betting total from 2024.

Still, casinos are expanding.

WarHorse announced on Wednesday that it will start a third phase of construction at the Lincoln casino that’s expected to cost around $70 million. The company hopes to break ground on the South Sioux City facility this fall or spring 2027, McNally said last month.

On Wednesday, McNally said revenue from mobile betting would be “significant.”

“If this gets on the ballot and passes in November, this is going to be significant revenue to the property tax relief fund,” McNally said. “That 20% is going to add up quickly.”

Morgan added that people located away from the cities where casinos are located currently bet on sports using a virtual private network to mask their location or they cross state lines. Legalizing online betting will encourage more in-state sports gaming money, he said.

As far as next steps, Morgan said on Wednesday that WarHorse and the Sports Betting Alliance have sent a revised draft of the petition back to the Secretary of State’s office.

“Little things matter,” Morgan said, “so we think that the language right now is where it needs to be.”

Once it warms up, Morgan said the committee will start to collect signatures, in hopes of submitting them in July.