Jason Robins targeted as California tribal sports betting offensive turns ugly

DraftKings CEO Jason Robins has been singled out in a new advert by rival tribal operators as the sports betting war taking place in the Golden State takes on an ugly new dimension.

In a 30-second advert aired on YouTube, the Californians for Tribal Sovereignty and Safe Gaming (CTSSG) group’s Protect Tribal Gaming campaign took aim at Robins over comments made by him at a recent industry event.

The ad accuses DraftKings and, by extension the California Solutions to Homelessness and Mental Health Support Act campaign, of ignoring its stated objective of helping the homeless and instead lining its own pockets through the extension and expansion of sports betting.

As evidence of this, CTSSG cites extracts of comments made by Robins at the Goldman Sachs Travel and Leisure Conference 2022 concerning the passage of legislation in California on June 6.

Robins said: “California has a ballot referendum that we and six others in our coalition in the industry are behind and are supportive of. That will run on the November ballot.

“We just recently announced that we had enough signatures to qualify, which is a huge milestone.

“So that’s pretty exciting. And I think if we’re able to pass in November, we could potentially be looking at a 2023 launch, hopefully ahead of NFL for California. [It’s a] really great bill too.”

Robins continued: “The tax rate, everything is set in a very reasonable way because you can actually write the whole piece of legislation on the ballot, which is nice.

“So there’s still licensing and other stuff that will have go to through the regulators, but a lot of that which could make it faster, who knows, is already defined through the legislation,” he added.

It is Robins’ latter comments on legislation and taxation that have drawn the scorn of the Protect Tribal Gaming campaign, suggesting that he went “off script.”

Take @DraftKings CEO's word for it, out of state sports betting corporations love the low tax rate in their self dealing CA ballot measure https://t.co/iPGawD4wcF

— Protect Tribal Gaming (@SafeGamingCA) June 28, 2022

In comments reported by the PlayCA website, CTSSG spokesperson Rob Stutzman expanded on the inflammatory comments made in the ad.

“The out-of-state CEO divulged this backroom tactic when he assured his investors that their California ballot measure is all about corporate profits and controlling the market,” Stutzman said.

“California voters are already catching on to this scam and are poised to thwart his corporate-profit dreams,” he added.

Stutzman’s opposite number, spokesperson for the multi-operator campaign Nathan Click, rebuked the rival campaign, inferring the mudslinging tactics would backfire in the November ballot.

“Californians aren’t going to be fooled by these false attacks,” Click said.

“California’s non-partisan budget analyst office estimated that our initiative would raise hundreds of millions in dollars each year for homelessness and mental health and addiction treatment – many times more revenue for the state than any other proposed or qualified sports betting initiative,” he added.

The two campaigns are set to go head-to-head for Californian voter approval in November, after each securing the required number of verified petition signatures as stipulated under state legislation.

Each party has thrown more than $100m into their respective campaign, with the multi-operator initiative being publicly supported by the crème de la crème of the US sportsbook market, including BetMGM, FanDuel, Penn National, and Fanatics.