Is Any Gambling Legal in Texas?
Yes. However, gambling remains highly restricted and places to gambling in the state are few and far between. The only legal gambling that is allowed in Texas is at their two casinos and eight horse racing and dog racing tracks. Gambling, whether it be tables games, slots or poker, is illegal outside of these casinos and race tracks.
Due to loopholes found in the Texas gambling laws in recent years private poker clubs have been popping up all over the state. That’s not to say that this poker clubs are perfectly legal. Many poker clubs have been raided over the years with charges of money laundering, gambling promotion and engaging in organized crime being laid.
Poker Clubs are legal in Texas if the operators of the club are not profiting from the game. The clubs that have been raided in the past were breaking those rules and taking in too much money for authorities to ignore. The future of private poker clubs in the state is unknown as authorities decide how lenient they want to be.
Recently, bills have been introduced to try and expand gambling in Texas. Sports betting remains illegal in Texas despite legislators attempts to introduce sports betting bills in 2019. The bills did not receive the support needed to pass.
In 2019 State Representative Eddie Lucio introduced HJR61 to amend the Texas constitution to allow sports betting, and HB1275 to create a sports betting oversight commission. Neither bills passed.
Another bill introduced in 2019 by State Representative Roland Gutierrez would have allowed up to 12 land-based casinos to be constructed in the state. This bill also failed to pass.
These bills may have gone nowhere but it does show there is an appetite for expanded gambling in the state, which could provide exorbitant amounts of tax revenues if eventually passed.
Texas Laws Pertinent to Online Poker
As we already said online gambling and online poker are not specifically recognize in Texas laws. However, the Texas criminal code’s laws on gambling are quite clear. Under section 47.03 of the Texas criminal code it states that any a person commits an offense if he intentionally or knowingly does any of the following acts:
- Earns profits from a gambling place
- Bookmaking
- Earns profit from being a custodian of anything of value bet or offered to be bet
- Sells chances on any game, contest or political nomination
- Sets up and runs a lottery
Anyone operating an online poker site in Texas would be committing at least one of these acts and subsequently violating the Texas criminal code.
