Oklahoma Sports Betting Bills Die On Senate Floor With No Vote
The Oklahoma Senate had a May 8 deadline to vote on two bills to legalize sports betting in the Sooner State, and no vote occurred.
Senate President Pro Tempore Lonnie Paxton said state senators could not come to an agreement in time to legalize Oklahoma sports betting in 2025, according to a report from KOKH News.
The two bills, each authored by Rep. Ken Luttrell, passed a House vote in March and a Senate committee vote in April before running out of gas on the Senate floor. The bills — House Bill 1047 and House Bill 1101 — advanced farther than any sports betting legislation in Oklahoma history.
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More Time Needed To Study the Issue
According to Paxton, Senators wanted to spend the summer learning more about the complexities of a legal sports betting industry in Oklahoma.
Earlier in the 2025 legislative session, the Senate approved three different sports betting bills.
Sen. Bill Coleman supported both of Luttrell’s bills, which sought to give Oklahoma tribes exclusive rights to online sports betting. He authored a third that would have given those rights to the Oklahoma City Thunder while allowing tribes to offer sports betting on tribal lands.
Coleman’s bill passed through the Senate but made no progress in its House committee before lawmakers pulled it from the agenda. Additionally, talks between the Thunder and the tribes never materialized, ending that bill’s hopes.
Thirty states allow online sports betting, and Missouri will add its name to that list later this year after voters legalized it last November.
OK Sports Betting Revenue Estimate
Had Oklahoma legalized sports betting in 2025, the tribes would have paid a 10% fee on all adjusted gross revenue from the vertical. Coleman estimated those fees would have brought the state between $14 million and $42 million annually and voted in favor of the bills passing the Senate committee.
Many Oklahomans find themselves subject to sports betting advertisements while watching their favorite sporting events, yet unable to bet legally. To place a legal wager, they must travel to a neighboring state.
As a result, people in the state may be tempted to stay home and use unregulated, black-market sportsbooks instead. This takes revenue that could have gone to state programs for mental health and responsible gambling and instead sends it offshore, posing additional risks to customers’ money and personal security.
Governor at Odds with Tribal Framework
Despite lawmakers making new headway on Oklahoma sports betting in 2025, they faced additional opposition from Gov. Kevin Stitt.
Stitt said multiple times and continues to maintain that he would veto any sports betting bill that involved tribal exclusivity. His actions align with previous efforts to amend tribal gaming compacts rather than automatically renew them.
That said, Stitt does not entirely oppose sports betting. He said earlier this year that he would like a free market solution that benefits the state of Oklahoma and not just the tribes, which are sovereign nations with separate governments.
“This isn’t complicated,” Stitt said. “You simply create the program that other states do, and you can roll that out. That was the plan that I put forward, and unfortunately, those aren’t the two bills that are moving across the Senate. These are tribal-pushed bills that are only going to benefit the tribes, and not the citizens of Oklahoma.”
