Will Paid-Entry Daily Fantasy Sports Ever Return To Idaho?
Daily Fantasy Sports are paid-entry competitions that allow you to choose a number of professional athletes to build a “team” with which you compete against other players. The better your “team” does, the more money you stand to win. Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t that sort of sound like, oh I don’t know, sports betting?
Well, whether you see it that way or not, that’s exactly what the attorney general in Idaho thought. As paid-entry DFS companies FanDuel and DraftKings offered gaming to those who lived in the state, Attorney General Lawrence Wasden became concerned that the services being offered fell under the definition of gambling within the state.
“The concern I have is that the paid daily sports offerings provided by these companies constitute gambling under Idaho law,” said Attorney General Wasden. “I have a duty to enforce and uphold that law.”
Wasden isn’t the only one to express concern. He is, however, one of the few to actually kick the sites out of his state. In 2016, Wasden reached an agreement with FanDuel and DraftKings that had them exiting the state and discontinuing their paid-entry services to residents in Idaho. Now, residents could still use the sites. They just couldn’t use real money.
The agreement reached between Idaho’s AG and the two DFS sites was contingent upon several things. First, the sites did not have to admit to any wrongdoing, so long as they stopped offering paid-entry services to residents. Second, the agreement was only reached with FanDuel and DraftKings, which means that technically, other paid-entry DFS sites could still operate in Idaho, which is interesting.
When AG Wasden reached this agreement, Idaho became the 11th state to refuse to allow the two Daily Fantasy Sports sites to operate. Texas (on a partial basis), Florida, and Nevada were some of the other states that have gotten rid of the DFS sites in 2016. It started to turn into a trend that wasn’t a very good one for Daily Fantasy Sports.
While bigwigs at FanDuel and DraftKings claim that their product is not gambling at all but a contest of skill, many AGs around the country begged to differ. Not all got rid of DFS in their states, but enough were doing it that action needed to be taken. So CEO’s Nigel Eccles (FanDuel) and Jason Robins (DraftKings) embarked on a country-wide tour in order to inform state legislatures why DFS was not gambling.
Their efforts paid off. To date, there are now 11 states that have legalized and regulated DFS. Several others, including Alabama, Texas, and Florida, have changed their tune and are trying to pass bills to legalize DFS. Idaho remains firmly against it, however, which begs the question, will Idaho residents ever get to play paid-entry DFS?
In the agreement made with FanDuel and DraftKings, AG Wasden noted that the sites could begin to offer paid contests once more if one of two things happened: the state legislature passed a pro-DFS bill, or a court with authority in the state ruled favorably for DFS contests.
While there is no such legislature on the books at the moment and no DFS court cases that IdahoGamblingSites.com is aware of in Idaho, it doesn’t mean that it isn’t a possibility in the future. Idaho residents who enjoyed paid-entry contests before they were banned might have a chance to enjoy them again. Appealing to your state representative would be a good start in reinstating these contests. Who knows, maybe this time next year you’ll be the new Idaho DraftKings champion.
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