Missourians to Decide on Sports Betting at Referendum, Court Rules

Cole County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Green has taken the defendants’ side in the highly debated matter of sports betting legalization in the state. 

Namely, Judge Green has decided that a constitutional amendment question to make sports betting legal in the state will reach Missourians at the ballot referendum scheduled for November 5. 

The judge ruled in favor of Secretary of State John “Jay” Ashcroft and the Winning for Missouri Education’s attempts while acknowledging that the plaintiffs failed in all four counts. 

The Signature Controversy 

In the spring, it was announced that the Winning for Missouri Education coalition had successfully submitted more than 340,000 signatures to see the sports betting initiative, that would offer funding for education in the state, reach the November ballot. 

However, on August 21, plaintiffs Jacqueline Wood and Blake Lawrence claimed the coalition’s campaign was missing some valid signatures in the first and fifth Congressional districts, deeming Ashcroft’s determination of sufficiency as incorrect.

Namely, the plaintiffs argued that the first Congressional district was currently the only one in flux with their counsel telling the courtroom that Ashcroft had improperly determined the number of valid signatures needed for the respective district. 

The counsel explained Ashcroft should have made use of the most recently established Congressional district boundaries.

Judge Green argued that the new boundaries have not yet been used in a gubernatorial election, entitling Ashcroft to not use them when establishing the necessary votes. 

Another of the remaining three counts the plaintiffs posited in their lawsuit referred to the way Ashcroft determined the exact number of necessary signatures, which was deemed incorrect by the two since it did not use the vote in the current boundaries of the First Congressional District as established in Section 128.461, RSMo. 

Additionally, the plaintiffs believed that Ashcroft incorrectly certified a sufficient number of “valid” signatures submitted from the First and Fifth Congressional Districts. According to Wood and Lawrence, the signatures were not legal.

Wood also claimed she was deprived of her rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in that “the method employed impermissibly and knowingly decreased the weight of a third Congressional District voter’s signature when compared to the weight of a First Congressional District voter’s signature.”

As explained by Judge Green, the plaintiffs had to prove that at least 83 of District One’s counted signatures were invalid. 

However, since all the signatures for the district were submitted on notarized pages, the court had to presume they were valid.

“A Big Victory for Missourians”

The coalition called the ruling “expected” while also referring to the decision as “a big victory for Missourians who overwhelmingly want to join the 38 other states that allow sports betting” which would, in turn, “provide tens of millions in permanent, dedicated funding each year” to public schools. 

In the same statement, the coalition explained that too many years have passed since Missourians “have watched as fans cross state lines to place sport bets,” depriving their public schools of “much-needed funding.”

“A vote for Amendment 2 in November,” the statement continued, “will bring those dollars back to Missouri classrooms.” 

According to the results of an Emerson College Polling/The Hill survey between June 17 and June 19, 2024, among 1,000 registered voters, more than a third of 1,000 registered voters who were interviewed said they would vote for the legalization of sports betting.