American sports fans are poised to wager $36.5 billion on Major League Baseball (MLB) this year, according to an estimate by the American Gaming Association (AGA) released just days before opening day. Of the $36.5 billion that will be wagered, $35.4 billion – or 97% – will be placed illegally through illicit offshore websites and sports bookies. Americans wager roughly $154 billion a year on sports illegally due to the 1992 federal prohibition on sports betting. “The amount wagered illegally on professional baseball is another sign the federal ban on sports betting has become an utter failure,” said Geoff Freeman,…

The Canadian parliamentary effort to decriminalize single-game sports wagering suffered an apparently fatal blow Wednesday night in the face of Liberal Party opposition. The House of Commons rejected single-game sports wagering bill C-221 by a close vote count of 156 to 133. Had it been approved, the bill would have been referred to the House’s Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Now, its hopes—and the hopes of single-game sports wagering in the country—are effectively dead for the foreseeable future. New Democratic Party MP Brian Masse, who introduced the bill, had argued that the passage of the bill would have created…