NC Family Staff | March 28, 2019 | SHARE: 
A bill under consideration in the N.C. Senate would add sports betting and wagering on horse racing to the forms of gambling allowed by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in Western North Carolina. The Cherokee casinos are already authorized to conduct gambling activities using gaming machines, table games with live dealers, video poker and other video games, raffles and bingo.
TAKE ACTION: Please join NC Family as we urge our state lawmakers to vote down this bill that would endanger North Carolina individuals and families! You can easily send an email to your NC Senator urging them to vote against this bill by going to the NC Family Action Center.
For more information on why Senate Bill 154 would be particularly dangerous to North Carolina, please read the statement below, given by NC Family President John L. Rustin before the Senate Commerce and Insurance Committee:
“While this may seem like an isolated and limited expansion of gambling, it is likely to have far-reaching implications for our state and beyond,” said Rustin.
“Decades of research on gambling consistently shows very high correlations between gambling addiction and increases in crime, theft, embezzlement, personal bankruptcy, domestic violence, child abuse, divorce and even suicide.”
“Sports gambling is particularly corruptive and addicting, and authorizing it for this purpose means that current gamblers at the Cherokee casinos will have even more ways to gamble, and some who are not currently attracted to the casinos will be enticed to go to gamble on sporting events and horse racing. Both will inevitably result in higher incidents of problem and pathological gambling among citizens in North Carolina and surrounding states.”
“A bill has already been introduced in the Senate to authorize the State Lottery Commission to oversee horse racing, and several statewide sports gambling bills are sure to come. How can you say that betting on sports and horse racing is okay in this case, but then reject it when it comes in these other much broader forms?”
“For these reasons, we ask that you oppose SB 154.”
