New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo wants 2019 to be the year legal sports betting comes to his state.
"Let's authorize sports betting in the upstate casinos," Cuomo said Tuesday early in his State of the State address. "It's here. It's a reality, and it will generate activity in those casinos."
New York passed a 2013 law that authorized four upstate casinos -- Del Lago Resort, Tioga Downs, Rivers (Schenectady) and Resorts World Catskills -- to offer in-person sports betting, if permitted by federal law.
In May, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992, a federal statute that had restricted state-sponsored sports betting to primarily Nevada. Since the ruling, legal sportsbooks have opened in Delaware, Mississippi, New Mexico, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and West Virginia, and more than 20 states are planning to pursue sports betting in 2019.