Jon Lender
The biggest names in Connecticut’s corps of government-influencing operatives have landed contracts worth nearly $2 million this year to lobby state legislators and executive branch officials about who gets to operate an expected new sports wagering program and who wins the war between tribal and commercial casinos.
Connecticut’s considerable cadre of government-influencing operatives have landed contracts totaling nearly $2 million this year to lobby state legislators and executive branch officials about who gets to operate an expected new sports wagering program, how it would work and who wins the ongoing struggle over construction of a commercial casino on non-tribal land in East Windsor or Bridgeport.
There’s money to be made, and there are interests to protect, as legalized gambling keeps expanding its reach into every corner of Connecticut. Gamblers soon may be able to bet on their mobile phones on not only the outcome of a major league baseball game — but also, within the game, on whether the next pitch is a strike or ball, or a fastball or curve.
The possibilities are endless as to the structure of whatever sports wagering bill is passed by the Connecticut General Assembly in the wake of a landmark
U.S. Supreme Court ruling last year. That ruling already has cleared the way for nearby states such as New Jersey and Rhode Island to start legal sports betting programs that let gamblers make previously forbidden wagers on major league games such as baseball and basketball, and Connecticut lawmakers say they don’t want to miss out potentially on tens of millions of dollars a year in revenue.
The complexities and pitfalls of the upcoming legislative process, not to mention executive branch decision-making, have led organizations with a financial stake in the soon-to-develop sports betting program to shell out big money in hopes of shaping it — either to profit, or to protect themselves. For example:
The Mashantucket and Mohegan tribes, which each run a casino on their separate, southeastern Connecticut reservations, have been lobbying to run any new state sports-betting program that the legislature would establish — and they say they are the only ones who should be permitted to do so, because of decades-old legal compacts under which the state gave them exclusive casino gaming rights in exchange for 25 percent of their gross slot machine revenue. The tribes also also have a joint project, called MMCT Venture LLC, that has been trying to open a commercial casino on non-tribal land in East Windsor.
Nevada-based casino giant MGM has spent millions in recent years in a so-far unsuccessful effort to win passage of a bill allowing open competition against MMCT Venture for state approval to build a commercial casino in Bridgeport. MGM hasn’t given up on that, and is again pressing for an open-competition casino bill.
Major League Baseball, the
National Basketball Association and the PGA Tour have formed a coalition here and in other states to protect both their financial interests and the integrity of their games in the way any sports betting program is written and implemented. The National Football League has launched a similar effort separately, with the same stated purpose of making sure any state-sponsored betting program abides by its official rules and decisions.
The result is a Matterhorn of money now piled up on the legislative table in Hartford. Reports filed with the Office of State Ethics reveal lobbying contracts worth a total of just under $2 million to contact legislative leaders, rank-and-file lawmakers, the governor’s office and other executive branch state officials. And that total is only for hired guns at the Capitol, not for inhouse employees who work at the Capitol without registering as lobbyists, such as the two top executives at the quasi-public Connecticut Lottery Corp. Also, big players, such as MGM, have in-house, salaried lobbyists, in addition to those hired under contract, and their salaries aren’t included in lobbying expenditure reports.
“Money is what this is all about, and it’s a lot of money — make no mistake,” said state Rep. Joe Verrengia, D-West Hartford, co-chairman of the legislative committee that oversees Connecticut gaming. “I am pretty confident that by the end of the legislative session [in June], if not sooner, a sports betting bill will become a reality. At this point it’s too early to know who will be operating it” — and he said that the contenders include the tribes, commercial casino operators, off-track betting operators, online fantasy sports companies such as DraftKings and FanDuel and the lottery corporation. It could be that several of them would share pieces of the operation, he said. He said he hears from lobbyists “almost on a daily basis.”
There’s been no legislative consensus yet as to whether sports wagering would be limited to buildings where gamblers would go to place their bets — as they now do at the tribal casinos and at 16 OTB operations run by Sportech Inc. — or if the betting also would happen online and on people’s mobile phones. Verrengia thinks it needs to be the latter. “I think without question, if we are going to get into the sports betting business, it’s imperative that we use a mobile platform.”
However, the highest-ranking member of the state Senate, President Pro Tempore Martin Looney, D-New Haven, said that’s “not necessarily” true, according to the divided sentiment in his majority caucus when it came up briefly last year. Looney said Connecticut’s path to approving sports betting has procedural obstacles that other states don’t face — in the form of the tribal compacts, under which the Mashantuckets and Mohegans have claimed so far that they’re the only ones who could run the program. The Lamont administration first would need to negotiate an agreement with the tribes to open sports betting to other operators without facing years of litigation. Then, that agreement would require approval from the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs before any legislative effort to launch the new program.
“I am hopeful” that a sports betting bill will pass during this year’s legislation, Looney said. “We certainly need the revenue.”
Following is the roster of lobbyists and their anticipated compensation under reports now on file with the ethics agency.
MGM
MGM, which has two major issues — potentially operating the legalized sports betting program, and trying to win its yearslong battle to open up competition for a commercial casino so it can build one in Bridgeport — has contracts with: Hartfordbased Sullivan & LeShane, which includes veteran Republican operative and strategist Patrick Sullivan, for $150,000; New Haven-based DePino, Nuñez, and Biggs, which includes former Republican State Chairman Chris DePino, for $150,000; Hartford-based Murtha Cullina, for $120,000; Penn Lincoln Strategies LLC of West Hartford, for $96,000; and, for $12,000, the Hartford office of Global Strategy Group, which includes Roy Occhiogrosso, former top staff aide to, and political operative for, ex-Gov. Dannel Malloy. One of Sullivan & LeShane’s lobbyists, Michael Johnson, is married to Colleen Flanagan Johnson, who is senior adviser to new Gov. Ned Lamont. She says she and administration officials consulted with the state ethics office and have agreed that “I will not take meetings with any of the clients for which my husband is the primary lobbyist” and she and her husband will not “discuss with each other the clients and issues on which he lobbies in the Executive Branch.” MGM’s total contracts for 2019 are $528,000.
Mashantucket Pequot Tribe/ Foxwoods Resort Casino
The Mashantuckets have a lobbying contract with Hartfordbased Robinson & Cole for $125,600.
Mohegan Tribal Gaming Authority
The Mohegan tribe has hired Rome, Smith & Lutz of Hartford, whose most visible member is former state Rep. Pete Smith of Milford, for $150,600.
MMCT Venture LLC
The joint commercial venture of the two tribal organizations for the East Windsor casino has hired Stu Loeser & Co., which includes former Malloy communications director Andrew Doba of Greenwich, for $180,000; former state Sen. David Cappiello of Capitol Hill Group LLC in Newtown, for $90,000; Rome, Smith & Lutz, for $60,000; Robinson & Cole, for $60,000; Innovate & Organize of Avon, which includes Lisa Winkler and Tricia Dinneen Priebe, for $36,000; and Ferrigno Government Relations LLC of West Hartford, for $30,000. MMCT’s total contracts for 2019 are $456,000.
Caesar’s
Las Vegas-based Caesar’s Enterprise Services LLC, which has stayed out of the commercial casino fight and is interested in running sports betting, has hired West Hartford-based Roy & LeRoy, headed by longtime lobbyist Craig LeRoy, for $50,000.
Sportech
Sportech Inc. is the operator of the Bradley Teletheater in Windsor Locks and 15 other MyWinners OTB outlets in Connecticut, at which patrons can bet on thoroughbred and harness racing, greyhounds and jai alai at venues across the U.S. and in other countries including Great Britain and Australia. MyWinners also accepts bets online, and includes a mobile app. Sportech wants to operate the sports betting program, and has hired Glastonbury-based TCORS Capi- tol Group, LLC for $85,000 and Graff Public Solutions LLC of Hartford for $40,000 this year. Sportech’s total contracts for 2019 are $125,000.
Shoreline Star
The Shoreline Star in Bridgeport, a former greyhound racetrack that now houses one of Sportech’s 16 OTB operations, is working with Sportech on its lobbying effort and has hired Gaffney, Bennett & Associates of New Britain, which includes longtime Republican political strategist Jay Malcynsky, for $63,810.
FanDuel and DraftKings
Two potential online/mobile sports fantasy operators, FanDuel and DraftKings, have each hired the same lobbyists, with the same legislative objectives, under identical contract terms of $36,000 for Washington, D.C.based Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, and $36,000 for West Hartford-based Capitol Strategies Group, which includes veteran lobbyists/Democratic activists Pat McCabe and P.J. Cimini. Their total contracts for 2019 are $144,000.
MLB
Major League Baseball has retained the Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe firm for $60,000. That lobbying firm has hired a subcontractor, Alaris Strategies of Virginia, for $9,163. Also, MLB has retained Capitol Strategies Group for $27,000; and The Connecticut Group LLC, based in Farmington, which includes veteran lobbyist Jim O’Brien, for $24,000. MLB’s total contracts for 2019 are $120,163.
MLB, as mentioned above, is in a coalition with the NBA and PGA Tour to lobby for rights and restrictions under whatever sports betting bill gets passed. Among the three leagues’ requests are a royalty of one-quarter of 1 percent of the total amount bet, partly to cover their increased risk and costs for monitoring and investigations to ensure integrity of their games — and partly out of what they consider fairness when the sports betting operators are making millions off their games. “We want Connecticut to pass a robust sports betting bill that protects the league’s interests and the fans of baseball,” said Bryan Seeley, senior vice president and deputy general counsel for Major League Baseball.
Seeley said Friday he could only speak for MLB’s objectives — which he said include the requirement that “sportsbooks … use official league data when settling in-game bets.” He explained that “the future of sports betting” is increasingly small, or “granular” bets on things like whether a player will get a hit in a given at-bat, or whether the next pitch will be a strike or a ball, or a curveball or fastball. “In order to offer these quick ingame bets, the bookmakers are going to have to settle the bets very quickly,” he said, and “there should be one single source of truth for betting outcomes.”
MLB also wants a voice in determining what bets can be offered, he said. For example, if a betting operator wants to start offering bets on minor league baseball, there may be issues of a greater vulnerability to games being compromised because of the lower pay at that level among people who could affect betting outcomes, including official scorekeepers, Seeley said.
He said that if it’s inevitable that states are going to legalize sports betting, “we think it’s better to come to the table and engage and encourage robust laws that protect” the integrity of the games. “We do realize that there’s a robust black market” in the form of offshore betting operations, Seeley said, and laws such as those contemplated in Connecticut will help in “bringing black market dollars into a more transparent, regulated market.”
NBA
The National Basketball Association, like MLB, has a $60,000 contract with Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, which has a $9,163 subcontract with Alaris Strategies. It also has $27,000 contract with Capitol Strategies Group, and a $24,000 contract with The Connecticut Group LLC. The NBA’s total contracts for 2019 are $120,163.
PGA
The PGA Tour has a $12,000 contract with Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, which has a $9,163 subcontract with Alaris Strategies. It also has $12,000 contracts with Capitol Strategies Group and The Connecticut Group LLC. The PGA’s total contracts for 2019 contracts are $45,163.
NFL
The National Football League — through a government relations firm, MultiState Strategies, which has offices in Great Neck, N.Y. and Alexandria, Va. — has retained locally Brown Rudnick Government Relations Strategies in Hartford, whose most prominent member is former state House Speaker Thomas Ritter (although the firm’s lobbyist on this matter is Timoty Shea). This year’s contract is for $66,000.