If the past few months have taught us anything it’s that Donald Trump does what he says he’s going to. Unless he doesn’t, in which case he does the complete opposite or something totally different altogether.
The reason we mention that at the beginning of this article is to give ourselves a caveat, a Get out of Jail Free card if you will. At the time of writing, the 47th President of the United States of America has the online gambling industry in his sights and is targeting growth, bigly growth.
However, depending on when you read this article, Donald Trump’s stance could have changed or his attention could have been diverted by something else. If that happens, blame him and not us, we’re just reporting on the big news today.
Trump caveat out of the way, what has the US President so fixated with online gambling? How is he going to transform his country’s gambling industry and how does that relate to Canada? Read on to find out.
Why Trump is Interested in Online Gambling
Prior to becoming a politician Donald Trump was a real estate magnet, and one of his pet projects in the 1980s was creating a gambling metropolis in Atlantic City that could rival Las Vegas. Trump threw everything at that project, building venues like the Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino and the Trump Taj Mahal and promoting Atlantic City as the venue for a number of high-profile boxing bouts.
Unfortunately for Trump, his vision of turning Atlantic City into the spiritual home of American gambling failed. Whilst his ambitions in that regard waned, his affinity for the gambling industry hasn’t and he still has ties with prominent business people within the sector.
Outwardly Trump has been sympathetic to the online gambling industry, but in private his ties to people like renowned anti-online gambling advocate Sheldon Adelson – a $25 million donor to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign – held him back from really backing and pushing the online sector.
Recently though that has all changed. In his second term in office Trump is less reliant on establishment allies and donors and instead seems more intent on pushing his world view and political philosophy. Part of that philosophy is making America a world leader in as many areas as possible, which brings us to online gambling.
Trump has been on record before saying that the United States is lagging sadly behind in terms of online wagering. In recent months, he has reacted negatively to Canadian iGambling outstripping American iGambling growth, citing a lack of regulation north of the border and a surplus of it in the USA as the reason behind that differential.
Is Regulation the Reason for Growth Differentials?
Like almost everything that Donald Trump says in public, there’s not much truth to his claims about regulation differences in the United States and Canada. Currently the majority of the most popular online casinos for Alberta players are international sites which cater for AB players.
The reason for the pre-eminence of overseas companies that are being accessed by Canadians is over-zealous regulations that dictate that only state run sites can be used. Activists and legislators are busy trying to dismantle this heavy handed regulation and free up the Canadian online gambling industry.
In the United States however, the federal ban on online and sports wagering was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2019, leaving the final decision over legalisation down to individual states. Currently there are only 11 states left in the US that have not legalized either online gambling or sports wagering and 8 of them are Republican.
Whilst the reasoning for not wanting to legalise either form of betting are nuanced in each state, the driving factor seems to be political ideology and conservatism. So, instead of calling out regulation, it would be more accurate for President Trump to crack the whip and call out the political conservatism of his base.
As unpredictable as Trump is, scoring a political own goal by doing that seems like something he is incredibly unlikely to do.
What will Trump do?
Instead of putting pressure on his own base, Trump will most likely seek to further relax regulations in states that have already legalised online gambling. Whilst this might sound like a good thing in practice, it will, in the long-run, be bad for domestic growth.
The United Kingdom which is the world leader in iGaming has a strong regulatory body that not only protects customers but protects and encourages domestic companies. Trump will likely ignore the British example and push ahead with making American online gambling a no-rules haven.
When the consequences of his decision come into effect and start to hurt American players and American companies though, Trump’s term will have ended and he will be able to sit on the side-lines and blame it all on whoever the incumbent is.