AGAINST THE ODDS

THE LAW PROFESSOR WHO TOOKON BIG TOBACCO HAS SET HISSIGHTS ON SPORTS BETTING

- SEAN GREGORY/BOSTON

ON A BALMY DECEMBER MORNING IN BOSTON, RICHARD Daynard is sitting at his dining-room table watching a livestream on his laptop. “Pure. Horsesh-it,” he declares as a witness testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The hearing has been called to discuss what seems to be becoming America’s new favorite pastime: throwing down bets on sports, 24/7. And what has set the bearded, bookish law professor off is a former gambling regulator from New Jersey’s use of a talking point favored by both the industry and the professional sports leagues: that the reason it’s so easy to wager on sports these days is this is what the American people want. To Daynard, president of the Public Health Advocacy Institute (PHAI) at Northeastern University’s law school, such language deflects from gambling’s heavy social toll. “This is consumer choice!” says Daynard, the sarcasm driving home his point. “This is freedom!”

Daynard has been fighting big public-health battles for decades. He played a foundational role building landmark legal cases in the 1980s and ’90s against U.S. tobacco companies, which ultimately resulted in cigarette manufacturers’ agreeing to pay more than $200 billion in settlement funds to the states. Now, at 81, he is no less indignant about the way companies seem to put profits over customer well-being. His latest objective is curtailing the excesses of sports gambling. “We’re talking,” says Daynard, “about addiction.”

Americans bet an estimated $150 billion on sports in 2024, up 24% from the prior year, according to the American Gaming Association, and sports books kept some $14 billion of that, up 27%. State governments collected about $2.5 billion in sports-betting tax revenue in 2024, a 19% jump. Networks broadcast incessant advertising, featuring premium pitchmen like Kevin Hart, LeBron James, Peyton Manning, and Jamie Foxx, from gambling companies like DraftKings, FanDuel, and BetMGM.