Whether it’s optimism or wishful thinking, there’s sentiment among gamblers that the new wagering tax rule embedded into President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act won’t stick.
Professional bettors have said the provision, which caps the losses gamblers can claim at 90%, could spell the end of their careers.
It also impacts recreational bettors, who could face a gambling tax burden even if they break even or lose.
Hope for a reversal came almost immediately. On July 4 – the same day Trump signed the bill into law – U.S. Rep. Dina Titus (D-Nevada) announced she would introduce legislation “to permanently restore the 100% loss deduction from gambling winnings.”
Titus’ Fair Accounting for Income Realized from Betting Earnings Taxation Act (FAIR BET Act) has received bi-partisan support, as Republican Congressmen Jeff Van Drew (New Jersey) and Mark Amodei (Nevada) have signed on as co-sponsors; so has Nevada Dem Steven Horsford.
Meanwhile, an effort to restore the 100% deduction for gambling losses by Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto was stymied by Republicans on Thursday, The Hill reported. Unanimous support was needed for the effort to be approved.
“It will do irreparable harm to our nation’s gaming industry if it takes effect — especially in Nevada,” Mastro pleaded.
How did the new gambling tax law make its way into Big Beautiful Bill?
While it came to light just hours before the OBBBA was passed, the gambling tax provision was reportedly inserted in the bill on June 16, part of a Senate Finance Committee document authored by Sen. Mike Crapo, unbeknownst even to many of his GOP colleagues.
Several Republican senators involved in writing the overall tax and spending bill, including Chuck Grassley (Iowa) and John Cornyn (Texas) “didn’t know how or why it was inserted into the bill,” the Huffington Post reports.
Cornyn went so far as to acknowledge, “I’m not sure what it does.”
As many pro gamblers suspected, the issue was too minor relative to others in the bill to be debated out in the 11th hour.
“I was so focused on Medicaid, I wasn’t looking for other reasons to be against the bill. But that would be another one,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) told HuffPost.
Related: How Trump is disrupting gambling
Gamblers want support of AGA
The support Rep. Titus has garnered for her legislation and the GOP’s awakening to the new gambling tax rule bolster optimism for its reversal. Gamblers, though, seek more robust backing from the American Gaming Association.
The AGA’s public endorsement of the Big Beautiful Bill came with a cryptic mention of the gambling tax.
“Our industry’s ability to sustain quality jobs and deliver economic benefits is significantly enhanced by the tax policies of the OBBBA that support consumers, encourage business innovation and investment, and strengthen US competitiveness,” reads the AGA’s statement. “[We] will work closely with Congress in the coming months to address the changes to wagering deduction losses and further modernize the tax code.”
To Russell Fox, a Nevada-based gambling tax specialist who has emerged as an authority on this issue, the AGA’s support is critical.
“The key on whether this sticks is what will the position of the AGA be,” Fox told Comped.com. “Not the public position – publicly, they’ll say they’re against it. They have no choice. Are they going to put in capital to get it removed? …
“If the AGA comes out against it and wants this law changed, it will be changed.”
