New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo wants 2019 to be the year legal sports betting comes to his state.
"Let's authorize sports betting in the upstate casinos," Cuomo said Tuesday early in his State of the State address. "It's here. It's a reality, and it will generate activity in those casinos."
New York passed a 2013 law that authorized four upstate casinos -- Del Lago Resort, Tioga Downs, Rivers (Schenectady) and Resorts World Catskills -- to offer in-person sports betting, if permitted by federal law.
In May, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992, a federal statute that had restricted state-sponsored sports betting to primarily Nevada. Since the ruling, legal sportsbooks have opened in Delaware, Mississippi, New Mexico, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and West Virginia, and more than 20 states are planning to pursue sports betting in 2019.
In the months after the Supreme Court ruling, the New York State Gaming Commission said it was creating sports betting regulations, but nothing has surfaced.
Cuomo did not offer any additional details regarding his plan for sports betting.
New York Assemblyman J. Gary Pretlow has said that he plans to introduce new sports betting legislation, potentially including an online element, this year, and believes that it is "90 percent" likely that sports betting would be approved during the 2019 legislative session.
An analysis by research firm Eilers and Krejcik Gaming projected that legal, land-based sports betting in New York could generate $532 million in annual gross gaming revenue.
