Nevada will always be viewed as the mecca of American gambling, and Nevada Rep. Dana Titus is determined to get all the breaks she can for America's gamblers.
Titus is utilizing another method for getting the Fair Bet Act through Congress. If passed into law, the bill would return to gamblers a 100% tax deduction for gambling losses.
Among the provisions inserted in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), pushed through Congress at the behest of US President Donald Trump, was a reduction in the tax breaks for gamblers. The maximum deduction for losses from gambling was downsized to 90%.
Titus believes that Republican Senators went about sneaking this change in the tax laws into the Big Beautiful Bill at the last minute. She doesn't believe that proper debate of this decision took place on the floor of the House of Representatives.
“The recently passed budget bill included a provision inserted by Senate Republicans without consent of the House that imposed a tax increase on Americans who gamble by reducing from 100 percent to 90 percent the amount of losses they can deduct from gambling winnings for their income taxes,” Congresswoman Titus said on her official website. “My FAIR BET Act would rightfully restore the full deduction for losses so gamblers don’t pay taxes on money they haven’t won.
“This common-sense legislation will bring fairness back to gaming taxation, making sure that gamblers can fully deduct losses when they report their winnings. It gives everyone – from recreational gamblers to high-stakes gamblers - a fair shake."
Titus is also of the belief that changing the tax laws involving gambling losses will only encourage players to switch their play to illegal offshore sites. By doing their online gambling at offshore sites, there's no record of wins or losses that the government can access.
"We should be encouraging players to properly report their winnings and wager using legal operators," Titus said. "The Senate change will only push people to not report their winnings and to use unregulated platforms.”
Titus originally filed the Fair Bet Act as a separate bill on July 7. Now she's looking to achieve passage of her bill by giving Republican Senators a taste of their own medicine. She says that her Fair Bet Act has bipartisan support.
She's attempting to push through the bill by attaching it to the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). That's how the reduction in the tax break also became law.
The NDAA is virtually certain to pass. This would mean that, as an amendment attached to the bill, the Fair Bet Act would also become law. It's a way for Titus to gain passage of her bill quickly, without needing to go through the drawn-out process of full legislative debate.
The change in gambling tax deductions is naturally unpopular with representatives of the gambling industry. Major players in the industry, including Caesars CEO Tom Reed, MGM Resorts International CEO Bill Hornbuckle, and Wynn Resorts CEO Craig Billings, have lobbied politicians seeking to have the change in the law corrected.
All changes that are part of the OBBBA don't go into effect until January 1, 2026. The next session of Congress doesn't begin until September. That still leaves time to reverse the gambling tax deduction reduction before it makes an impact on players.
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