Illinois Legislators Introduce Pair of Bills to Legalize Online Casinos

^{The Illinois House and Senate are working together in Springfield on legislation that would bring online casino gambling to the state. (Image: Sean Pavone / Alamy)}

A pair of bills were introduced to both houses of the Illinois legislature on Thursday with the goal of legalizing and regulating online casinos in Illinois.

The bills, known as Senate Bill 1963 and House Bill 3080, would create the Internet Gaming Act, which would authorize iGaming in Illinois.

Bill Addresses Cannibalization Concerns 

Under the legislation, operators would pay $250,000 for online gaming licenses, which would allow an operator to run up to three skins in the state. Online casino revenue would then be taxed at 25 percent, with those proceeds benefiting the state gaming fund. 

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker had already suggested he was open to online casinos in the state, calling the idea “worthy of consideration” last month. However, as in many states, land-based operators have expressed concerns that online revenues could cannibalize revenues from brick-and-mortar gaming facilities.

The bills introduced Thursday look to mitigate those concerns. The Illinois Gaming Control Board would be prohibited from awarding an iGaming license to any company that had reduced its workforce by 25 percent or more since Feb. 28, 2020, or renewing a license for a firm that had reduced its workforce by that amount since first receiving its license. Those percentages include employees at the land-based casinos owned by the gaming firms – an effort to preserve jobs at traditional casinos.

Those provisions could be important in Illinois, a state that is home to 16 casinos of various sizes. That includes Bally’s Chicago, the facility currently running at a temporary facility out of Medinah Temple and which is scheduled to open at its permanent location in River West late in 2026.

DEI Measures Could Prove Controversial

The two bills, introduced by Senator Cristina Castro (D-Elgin) and Representative Edgar Gonzalez (D-Chicago), also include a provision requiring all licensed online gambling operators to file annual reports on their DEI measures. Operators would be required to hold annual public workshops and job fairs, as well as outline their spending on businesses owned by women, minorities, veterans, and other groups.

Such a provision could be controversial in the current environment, and not just because of the Trump administration’s hardline stance against DEI initiatives. The American Alliance for Equal Rights is suing Bally’s Chicago, claiming that a $250 million initial public offering that was exclusively for women, people of color, and other “socially disadvantaged” groups discriminated against white men who wanted to invest in the casino.

Castro has previously filed legislation to allow online casinos in Illinois in 2021 and 2023, though neither bill made significant progress.

While online sports betting has flourished across the United States, fewer states have regulated online casino gambling. So far, online casinos have only been legalized and regulated in Connecticut, Delaware, Michigan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, though several other states are considering legislation to regulate such sites.