Gaming Tax Hikes Fizzle as Wyoming Panel Walks Out Early

A push to raise taxes and tighten oversight on Wyoming’s gambling industry went nowhere Tuesday — and the meeting went with it.

After hours of sparring, the Legislature’s Select Committee on Capital Financing and Investments abruptly adjourned, leaving two gaming bills unheard and signaling there’s no appetite in the House — particularly among Freedom Caucus members — for new taxes or tougher rules on sports betting, skill games or historic horse racing.

“Should we just quit for the day?” chair Sen. Tara Nethercott (R-Cheyenne) asked sarcastically after a key oversight measure failed on a split House–Senate vote.

Moments later, she called it:

“I don’t think we should have another meeting to discuss this… It’s wasteful knowing that it’s so unproductive.”

The committee had planned to take up four bills:

• Statewide monitoring system: Would’ve required the Wyoming Gaming Commission to stand up a central hub to track gambling data across platforms. It failed when three House members — including two from the Freedom Caucus — voted no. Even though all six senators and three representatives supported it, the draft needed a majority from both chambers’ members on the panel.
• Online sports betting tax hike (10% → 20%): After grilling an industry lobbyist, the committee voted not to advance the increase. Last year, the 10% tax brought in $1.4 million. The proposal would’ve doubled that, with $300,000 earmarked for county programs addressing problem gambling; the rest would have gone to the general fund.
• Skill-based amusement games (20% → 25%): Never heard before adjournment.
• Historic horse racing/simulcast fees: A tweak to shift an additional 1% of handle from local governments to the state highway fund. Also never heard.

Nethercott said the “writing was on the wall”: a House controlled by the Freedom Caucus won’t sign off on more regulation or taxation in this space.

“Yay! Lots of predictability in your bottom line,” she quipped to the industry, before adding she wasn’t sure that was “good for the people of Wyoming.”

Sarah Filosa of the Sports Betting Alliance (representing FanDuel, DraftKings, BetMGM, Bet365, Fanatics) argued the 20% tax would hurt consumers by forcing operators to worsen odds, cut promos, and spend less on responsible-gaming tools, driving bettors to untaxed offshore sites.

That landed with a thud. John Bear (R-Gillette), the committee co-chair and former Freedom Caucus leader, pressed whether companies really intervene with problem gamblers:

“How do you know if one of your customers is destroying their families or lives by gambling?”

He compared promo strategies to “a drug dealer giving a free couple of samples to get you hooked.” Mike Gierau (R-Jackson) said he’s seen no evidence state tax rates meaningfully shift betting lines:

“I haven’t seen any evidence of that.”

Filosa maintained operators have responsible gaming departments, flag unusual activity (say, 4 a.m. bets on ping-pong in Japan), and can ban users. Nethercott pushed back on the industry’s heavy Wyoming-targeted marketing around the bill, calling it “propaganda” and asking for a price tag (Filosa didn’t have one).

With doubts piling up and no House majority in sight, the tax hike failed, and the chair pulled the plug on the rest of the agenda.

Bear said he opposes all the tax proposals and doesn’t want Wyoming becoming dependent on gambling revenue. Nethercott countered that letting the market run with minimal oversight and taxation risks it “getting out of control,” and said the Legislature has stalled on meaningful guardrails for two to three years.

Could these ideas resurface? Sure — as individually sponsored bills next session. But it’s a budget year, meaning non-budget bills need two-thirds to even be introduced. Historically, that’s a tall order — especially for measures the House Freedom Caucus already blocked in committee.

For now, the takeaway for sportsbooks, skill-game operators and horse-race parlors is simple: no new taxes, no new rules — and no more meetings on it, at least from this committee.

With input from Cowboy State Daily and Gillette News Record.