The first attempt at rolling back gambling-related tax provisions in President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” was unsuccessful.
Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto sought unanimous consent of Rep. Dina Titus’ FAIR BET Act. The bill received bipartisan support, but Sen. Todd Young objected to it.
The FAIR Bet Act stands for Fair Accounting for Income Realized from Betting Earnings Taxation Act. Titus filed the proposal last week, and it would remove the changes made to the tax code in Trump’s budget bill by permanently restoring the 100% loss deduction from gambling winnings.
In Trump’s new plan, gamblers could only write off 90% of their losses. Several prominent poker players said it would severely harm the gambling industry, especially live pros and even the ones playing on online poker sites, since they would be paying taxes on money they didn’t win.
In response, the Congresswoman from Nevada filed her bill, which would nullify those changes. But Young’s objection stalls the bill for now.
Lawmakers Didn’t Know About The Gambling Provision
Trump’s bill was approximately 1,000 pages in length. It’s incredibly unlikely lawmakers in Congress read a bill of that length. As a result, Cortez Masto told the Associated Press that most didn’t even know about the provision.
“My understanding is many Republicans, many Democrats did not even know it was part of that process,” Cortez Masto said.
Under the current bill approved by the administration, a player winning $100,000 but also accruing losses of $100,000 would still pay taxes on $10,000. Many have predicted that the provision could have negative consequences not only for poker players and gamblers, but for the gaming industry overall.
“There will be less people that can gamble, less money to be won, more people going overseas, more people going (through) illegal routes,” poker pro Doug Polk said in a video addressing the issue. “There are all these negative impacts that could very well cost you more than this 10% you’re trying to gain.”
The government estimates that the additional tax revenue would account to about $1.1 billion over eight years. Congress is expected to consider the FAIR BET bill in both houses in the coming days.
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