The midterm election's biggest losing bets: Two measures seeking sports gambling in California
Nearly a half-billion dollars were poured into campaigns aimed at bringing sports gambling to California at tribal casinos and online, in what turned out to be
Nearly a half-billion dollars were poured into campaigns aimed at bringing sports gambling to California at tribal casinos and online, in what turned out to be the biggest losing bets of this political season.
Propositions 26 and 27 not only lost, but also went down in overwhelming numbers rarely seen in modern 50-50 politics.
Proposition 26, which sought to bring point spreads to Native American casinos, was being rejected by 70.1% to 29.9%, tallies showed Wednesday night. Meanwhile, Proposition 27, the measure that sought to legalize online sports betting, was going down to even greater defeat by 83.3% to 16.7%.
“This might go down in history, in the Michael Bloomberg Hall of Fame,” Dan Schnur, a campaign finance reform advocate, said, poking fun at the former New York City mayor and media tycoon’s brief $1 billion presidential run of 2020.
Schnur, a former GOP operative and a onetime chairman of the California Fair Political Practices Commission, struggled to recall any campaigns in the state that did less with this much money.
Rating: 5