Speaker McCutcheon: ‘People are wanting us to vote on a lottery’

With just days to go until the 2020 legislative session gavels into order in Montgomery, gambling remains one of the top issues in the eyes of the public for the Alabama legislature.

During an appearance on Huntsville radio’s WVNN, State Speaker of the House Mac McCutcheon (R-Monrovia) acknowledged the public’s interest in gambling, in particular, the institution of a lottery.

However, McCutcheon also said you could not have the discussion of a lottery without recognizing all the other gaming interests in the state, including the casinos housing bingo machines that were legalized at the county level and the gaming legalized on Indian tribal land in the state.

“There are days that I may feel optimistic, then there are days that it just comes unraveled,” McCutcheon said on his level of optimism about the prospects of a lottery. “I think we’re at a point in Alabama, and I think the members of the legislature realize this — people are wanting us to vote on a lottery. We have heard it, and that sentiment has grown over the years. But the problem that we have with the lottery is that it is not just a lottery. You get other interests involved as such as the other local interests, and that’s what hurt us last year when we had the lottery on the floor that came from the Senate. It was the counties that are involved in county gambling, like the bingo machines and those kinds of things. You’ve got Macon County, Greene County, Lowndes County — you’ve got Jefferson County that comes into play. Because of that, they are always in the discussion with the lottery vote.”

“And now because of some initiatives from the Poarch Creek Indians — they’ve been running commercials now for a month or so — you’ve got that interest that has got people’s attention,” he continued. “So now, we’re looking at three issues — we can’t talk about the lottery without talking about the Poarch Creek issue. We can’t talk about the Poarch Creek issue without talking about the local issue. My objective here is to move forward with no certain piece of legislation as a priority — I want to emphasize that — but move forward and start bringing these groups to the table and let’s find out exactly where we are.”

The Madison County Republican noted the difficulties in reaching the thresholds required in the legislature needed to give the people a vote on a lottery, which has been one of the primary obstacles.

@Jeff_Poor is a graduate of Auburn University, the editor of Breitbart TV, a columnist for Mobile’s Lagniappe Weekly and host of Huntsville’s “The Jeff Poor Show” from 2-5 p.m. on WVNN.