Six Months in, the AGA Exodus Has Reshaped US Gambling’s Lobbying Landscape

Fractured Lobbying Panorama Augurs Competitors in Heightened Regulatory Atmosphere

The AGA survey states that govt sentiment hit its highest stage for the reason that third quarter of 2022, with a 21.4% internet optimistic outlook throughout key enterprise indicators. The affiliation’s Gaming Situations Index – a composite of income, employment, wages, govt sentiment, and on line casino resort occasion exercise – is up 1.5% year-over-year, and greater than 60% of the executives surveyed mentioned they count on greater revenues, stronger steadiness sheets, and elevated capital funding over the subsequent 6-12-month interval.

Nevertheless, the image adjustments when the dialogue shifts to a quickly rising competitor. 81% of respondents recognized prediction markets providing sports activities occasion contracts as a “very vital” danger to the regulated gaming trade. AGA president and CEO Invoice Miller framed prediction markets in his assertion as an encroachment on authorized, state-regulated, and tribal-regulated operators, characterizing sports activities occasion contracts as a type of unlawful sports activities betting that the trade intends to maintain contesting.

This posture is in step with the AGA’s earlier strategy to actors like Kalshi and Polymarket, however its membership – and due to this fact the lobbying clout – has considerably receded previously half yr. The exits started on November 18, 2025, when Draftkings and Fanduel confirmed in separate statements that they’d relinquished their AGA memberships over misalignment with the commerce group’s stance on prediction markets. Each operators had introduced prediction-market plans throughout their Q3 2025 earnings calls – Draftkings via its Railbird acquisition and Fanduel by way of a Commodity Futures Buying and selling Fee–regulated partnership with CME Group. Each merchandise are actually reside: Draftkings Predictions launched December 19, 2025, throughout 38 states, whereas Fanduel Predicts launched three days later in 5 states with a phased nationwide rollout.

Three weeks later, Fanatics Betting and Gaming additionally confirmed its withdrawal, citing the identical motive – a distinction of opinion on prediction markets following the December 3 launch of its Fanatics Markets product. The identical week, the Sports activities Betting Alliance introduced that Joe Maloney – the AGA’s senior vp of strategic communications – was shifting over to steer the SBA as president and CEO. The crossover crystallized what had been an open query concerning the two commerce teams’ relationship.

The SBA represents 5 on-line operators – of which three actively supply prediction-market merchandise, one (BetMGM) opposes them, and one (bet365) has not said a place – and consequently doesn’t take a unified place on the vertical itself. The 2 teams now sit on reverse sides of the federal lobbying calculus on prediction markets. The structural final result is that the affiliation enters the again half of 2026 with no purely on-line operator remaining in its membership, whereas the SBA – led by a former AGA govt – now carries the lobbying weight for the nation’s largest on-line sportsbooks.

Not everybody broke ranks with the AGA due to prediction-market disputes. Notably, bet365 cited the commerce group’s give attention to the retail on line casino trade quite than any prediction-market dispute as the rationale behind its departure from the affiliation in March. An AGA spokesperson advised SBC Americas this was “not a brand new growth” and declined to specify timing.

The lobbying panorama these operators are getting into is extra crowded than it was a yr in the past. Kalshi spent $615,000 on federal lobbying in 2025, in response to OpenSecrets knowledge cited by CNBC, whereas Polymarket spent $360,000. Final winter, Kalshi helped launch the Coalition for Prediction Markets, a commerce group whose membership now consists of Coinbase, Crypto.com, Robinhood, and Underdog. Per Sportico, the coalition expects to spend tens of millions of {dollars} in 2026 to defend the CFTC-regulated framework for prediction markets. The membership composition represents a constituency with out precedent in US playing lobbying. Each Kalshi and Polymarket depend Donald Trump Jr. as an advisor.

The following federal strain level lands on Could 20, when the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Client Safety, Expertise, and Information Privateness convenes its first listening to immediately addressing prediction markets and their intersection with sports activities wagering. AGA president Invoice Miller, Tennessee Sports activities Wagering Council govt director Mary Beth Thomas, Integrity Compliance 360 co-founder and CEO Scott Sadin, and former Home Monetary Providers Committee chairman Patrick McHenry, now a senior advisor on the Coalition for Prediction Markets, are the confirmed witnesses on the time of writing.

Subcommittee chair Marsha Blackburn has indicated she intends to ship a suggestion framework earlier than the August recess, with the Senate Commerce and Banking Committees anticipated to reconcile competing approaches earlier than the 2026 midterms devour the legislative calendar.

A number of legislative automobiles are already in movement: the Occasion Contract Enforcement Act and the Prediction Markets are Playing Act would collectively limit sports-related contracts on federally regulated exchanges, with the Prediction Markets Safety and Integrity Act of 2026 additionally into account. In late April, senators unanimously voted to ban themselves and their workers from taking part in prediction markets.

The Could 20 listening to will mark the primary event on which the realigned lobbying ecosystem of the previous six months exams itself earlier than a Senate physique – and the primary time the AGA’s narrowed coalition argues its place with out the nation’s largest on-line sportsbooks on the desk.