Texas Lottery On The Path To Continue After Unanimous Senate Vote

The Texas Lottery rides again!

Or, at least, it appears as if it won’t be put out to pasture just yet, as the Texas Senate unanimously approved a bill to keep it around for the next two years.

Senate Bill 3070 would take the Texas Lottery out of the hands of the to-be-abolished Texas Lottery Commission and move it to the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation. It would also create laws to make it a criminal offense to buy lottery tickets online or in massive bulk. The bill would also demand a review in two years.

“They have a two-year lease on life — we’ll see what happens under the new agency,” Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said after the bill was passed last week, according to The Texas Tribune. 

While Patrick talks like this is a done deal, it’s not entirely across the finish line, according to the newspaper.

Two shots

This bill is one of two legislative threads by which the survival of the Texas Lottery is hanging. Currently under standard Sunset Commission review, the lottery needs legislative approval to continue operations in one form or another.

A second bill, SB 2402, would keep the lottery commission intact, but it faces a significant obstacle: Lawmakers have stripped all commission funding from the upcoming budget, and it would need to be restored for continued operations.

Time is running short, as either bill must clear a House committee by Friday for the full chamber to consider the lottery’s future. Meanwhile, the House Licensing & Administrative Procedures Committee has already reviewed SB 28, which would prohibit courier services, but has not yet moved it forward.

SB 3070, authored by state Sen. Bob Hall, comes on the heels of a tumultuous two years for the Texas Lottery, bookended by a pair of lottery wins that raised the eyebrows of legislators.

The first was in 2023, when investment group Rook TX purchased every possible number combination for a $95 million jackpot, reportedly with special accommodations from the Texas Lottery Commission for ticket printing.

More recently, a woman who bought her winning $83.5 million ticket through the Jackpocket app had her payout frozen when Patrick ordered an investigation, despite no evidence that the winner did anything wrong.

“The problems we’ve had are not a result of some very smart people from outside the government figuring out how to beat the system. What we had here was the criminal activities taking place came from within the commission itself,” Hall said, claiming the rules created by the Texas Lottery Commission were in violation of state law.