A super PAC backed by sports betting giants DraftKings and FanDuel spent more than $9.3 million in Alabama Republican primaries, helping deliver wins for candidates likely to shape the state’s next fight over lottery, casino gambling and sports wagering.
Bloomberg reported that the American Conservative Fund backed 17 Alabama candidates in Tuesday’s Republican primaries, and that at least 12 won outright, according to its analysis of Decision Desk HQ results. Still, the PAC’s record was not unbroken. Its most expensive Alabama race ended in defeat when former Senator Rusty Glover, R-Mobile, beat businessman Doug Harwell, R-Mobile, despite more than $2.2 million in PAC support for Harwell.
The spending marks one of the most aggressive political pushes yet by national sports betting interests in Alabama, a state that has repeatedly refused to legalize a lottery or online sports wagering despite years of legislative attempts and broad public support for allowing voters to decide the issue.
It also signals a strategic shift.
Rather than waiting for another gambling bill to be filed in Montgomery, national sports betting interests spent heavily in the primaries that help determine who will vote on the next proposal.
Alabama remains one of the few states without a state lottery or legal online sports betting. Efforts to legalize gambling have repeatedly passed one chamber only to stall, narrow or die before reaching voters.
In 2024, the Alabama House passed a sweeping gambling package that would have allowed a lottery, sports betting and up to 10 casinos with table games. The Senate scaled back the House plan, removing sports betting and barring casinos outside tribal land. The proposal still would have required approval by three-fifths of lawmakers and a majority vote of the people.
The final 2024 effort failed in the Senate by one vote. Lawmakers ended that session without approving a final gambling bill, continuing the state’s decades-long stalemate.
In 2025, another proposal failed to gain enough support. Senate President Pro Tempore Garlan Gudger, R-Cullman, said a comprehensive gambling bill allowing a lottery, sports betting and several casinos had too few votes to pass.
That repeated failure has made Alabama both politically difficult and commercially valuable for the sports betting industry. The state has no legal online sports wagering market, a large population and one of the most intense college football cultures in the country.
The American Conservative Fund’s primary spending suggests the industry is no longer focused solely on lobbying lawmakers after elections are over. It is now trying to shape the field before those lawmakers arrive in Montgomery.
Even with its notable loss in Senate District 34, the broader result was significant. The spending showed that sports betting money can be a major factor in Alabama Republican primaries and that national gambling interests are willing to intervene before the Legislature is even seated.
That intervention gives lawmakers, lobbyists and political organizations a new reality to consider ahead of the next gambling debate. In previous years, gambling legislation was largely fought inside the State House through lobbying, procedural maneuvering, regional disputes over licenses and disagreements over whether sports betting should be included.
The 2026 primaries showed that the fight is now also being waged earlier, in district-level campaigns where outside spending can shape the field before lawmakers return to Montgomery.
Supporters of gambling expansion argue that Alabama is forfeiting revenue to neighboring states while denying voters the chance to decide whether to authorize a lottery, casinos or sports betting. Opponents argue that expanded gambling would bring addiction concerns, social costs and more political influence from gambling operators.
Those arguments are familiar.
The scale of national sports betting money entering Alabama legislative primaries is not.
Any gambling proposal would still face a difficult path. A constitutional amendment requires approval from three-fifths of lawmakers and then a statewide vote. The Senate has repeatedly been the chamber where gambling bills have narrowed or died, even as public polling has shown broad support among Alabama voters for being allowed to decide the issue themselves. The Alabama Political Reporter previously reported polling showing 89 percent of voters wanted the chance to vote on gambling, lottery and sports wagering.
The American Conservative Fund’s success in Tuesday’s primaries does not guarantee passage of a gambling bill. The next Legislature will still have to navigate the same constitutional threshold and political divisions that have blocked gambling proposals for decades.
Any future proposal will still have to move through the Legislature and then, if approved, to voters. But after Tuesday’s primaries, sports betting interests have shown they intend to influence the outcome long before a bill reaches the State House floor.
