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Can Tyler Perry's BET Special Dispel COVID-19 Vaccine Fears? - Atlanta, GA - Show scheduled for Thursday night is aimed at the Black community where 1 in 3 people are hesitant to take the vaccine. Politics provides bettors with plenty of options due to the fact that you can not only bet on electoral outcomes but also bills, acts and budgets to name a few.

Is it fun to gamble on politics? You bet! Pixabay/Jan Vasek

Everybody has a political opinion and a prediction about who will win the 2020 election. But are you willing to “put your money where your mouth is,” as the old adage goes? Well, you can bet on political outcomes, and the industry has only become bigger in recent years. Not only can you gamble on who you think will win the presidential election, but such bets might also give us a clue about who could win, according to political scientists.

Is It Legal to Bet on Political Outcomes?

Gambling in America used to be heavily regulated. Back in the 1980s and early 1990s, betting on politics was a growing industry, just like it is in sports. But former NBA star Bill Bradley, who served three terms as a New Jersey senator from 1979 to 1997, led the charge to curtail gambling. Enter PAPSA, the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act. It was a federal ban on sports gambling that curtailed betting on sports—and politics. The bipartisan effort passed the Democratic-controlled Congress and was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush in 1992, going into effect in January of 1993. Only four states were exempt from this: Oregon, Montana, Delaware and, of course, Nevada, as all four already had some sort of statewide regulated gambling.

SEE ALSO: How to Combat the Sinister Role Deepfakes Will Play in the Election

New Jersey challenged PAPSA in the courts, and it went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which struck down the law and handed New Jersey, and gamblers, a big victory. Congress could still get involved in the future, states still need to pass laws enabling regulated gambling, and the Federal Wire Act stands in the way of online betting, but placing wagers on politics is back in business.

As Legal Betting Online points out, “The irony of betting on the elections and events associated with those politicians attempting to outlaw gambling is not lost on the American people.”

Believe it or not, such predictive markets answering “yes” or “no” questions about politics—like, “Will Donald Trump be reelected?” or “Will Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard drop out next month?”—were allowed even before PAPSA was dumped, as regulators sort of ignored these measures. Why? “For the valuable insight they provided,” writes Sports Betting Dime. “As traders buy and sell their shares, researchers get a better idea at what the collective mind is thinking about candidates and the events surrounding them. The idea is that people are buying shares based on what they truly believe is going to happen, not just what they want to happen. These markets provide real-time insight into political campaigns, and how different events impact them.”

How Betting on Ballots Works

To find out more about the nuts and bolts of political bets, I spoke to oddsmaker Mike Pierce with online sportsbook TopBet.eu. I went to their site and asked some questions about how to place a wager and what the numbers mean, as I am a novice gambler.

For example, the site lists Donald Trump at -125. Does that mean he’s going to win or lose? “Since Trump is a -125 favorite, you would need to risk $125 to win $100 on him to be president in 2020,” Pierce explained.

TopBet.eu also lists +200 for Elizabeth Warren, but that doesn’t mean they think she’s going to win. “Conversely, if you [look at] Warren, who is +200 to be the next president, a $100 bet on her would win you $200 net profit.”

So how do they determine these odds, who gets a minus (-) sign and who gets a positive (+) sign next to their names?

“At the current moment, we win money if Trump is reelected as president and lose money if Warren is elected U.S. president,” Pierce said. “This is because 37% of cash on the 2020 U.S. presidential future is backing Warren who is a +200 underdog, while 29% of cash on the future is backing the -125 favorite Trump.”

Do Betting Markets Help Predict the Future?

The literature from academia on political betting as a predictor is a lot more supportive than you may think. Given that a good theory can describe, explain and predict, why not an independent assessment via betting?

“Prediction markets apparently originated in 1988, when the first Iowa Electronic Markets predicted the winner of the presidential election,” writes Michael Abramowicz in his article “The Politics of Prediction” published in Innovations: Technology, Governance, Globalization, an MIT Press Journal. “The founds of the Iowa Electronic Markets wanted a vehicle that would better explain the workings of the financial markets, and their approach built on the work of experimental economists who had conducted experiments using simplified financial markets in the laboratory.”

But betting on politics goes even further back to the days of post-Civil War politics. In the Journal of Economic Perspectives, Paul W. Rhode and Koleman S. Strumpf found that bets were a pretty good forecast of elections, even before the era of scientific surveys from 1868 to the 1940s. But an analysis of betting on the 2008 Democratic Party primary candidates by Emily West in the Journal of Politics showed a mixed result for determining the connection between belief in success and bets.

I visited RealClearPolitics and saw that while Joe Biden is leading the national polls by a little—ahead in New Hampshire and even Massachusetts (Warren’s state), taking Nevada, winning South Carolina and Texas by a wide margin, losing only Iowa—he’s trailing Warren in betting odds by a 33-point margin. I asked Pierce how that could be.

“We feel that while Biden is the more well-known candidate, it appears Warren is starting to be the more popular candidate,” he explained. “She is starting to receive more money for fundraising compared to Biden. This is a big reason why we think she will be the Democratic nominee for president next year.”

I’m not so sure, but it is fascinating that the outcomes of betting could be so different from the polls. We’ll find out next year if using your head and following the surveys is the smart wager, or gambling on your heart and betting on who you want to win could be the best plan.

One final note: Before you lay down a single dollar on a bet, do your research and make sure you’re casting your lot with a reputable site that has a good track record of paying off when you win.

John A. Tures is a professor of political science at LaGrange College in LaGrange, Georgia—read his full bio here.

Our regular readers will remember a previous article of ours titled, “What Kinds of Entertainment Bets Can I Make“. You may remember from that article that we touch up on the topic of politics a little bit, but barely, just a mention really.

In this article, we’re going to go just a little deeper into everyone’s favorite, don’t-talk-about-it-at-the-bar topic, politics.

Keep in mind, we’re not political masterminds here, never claimed to be. We’re not here to tell you who you should vote for. That’s nobody’s business but your own.

We just want to point out that if you think you’re politically savvy, you can absolutely put your money where your mouth is and make some dough while doing it!

No matter if you love or hate the guy, you can make some money based on his future!

Where Can I Place Bets on Politics? A Top 3

You can make any of these your top sportsbook if you would like. There are reasons we support them and use them ourselves! We are also huge fans of joining more than one sportsbook to ensure that you are always getting the best lines and the best odds!

Just click on any of these names if you’d like to know more about each sportsbook and be taken to our honest reviews! Also, click on the big pictures to be taken directly to any of the mentioned sites!

Bovada

Not only US friendly, but very US politics friendly as well. As this is being typed, (September 29th 2019) there are four categories to choose from for your wagers, surely with more to come as we get closer to our elections! Keep reading and scrolling to learn more about these categories.

Not only can you bet on politics, but you can also get in on the action on some more random, unexpected things as well, such as snooker, darts, and even table tennis (yes, ping-pong)!

Usually, the standard welcome bonus over at Bovada is a match bonus of up to $250, however, for the time being that has actually been lifted to $1000 if you use one of the following codes when making your initial deposit!

• BVNFL1000
• BVNCAAF1000

Better get in on that before it’s too late and they’re not doing it anymore!

BetOnline

Another very US friendly sportsbook that accepts many different types of currency for deposits. Of all the choices, you’ve got

• bitcoin
• Litecoin
• Visa
• Mastercard
• Person-to-Person
• Check
• Money Order

and others!

You can also try them out without losing any money! Head on over there and check out their promotion for a Risk Free $25 Wager!

BookMaker

This one is perhaps the most fun, at least at the time of this writing. As of right now they have the most options as far as breaking down the wagers, as much as they can anyway and even throw in some international stuff in there for those that are interested in the things that go on over across the waters.

BookMaker also has some of the greatest promotions and rewards for those that choose to use bitcoin. If you would like to know more about some of the best bitcoin wallets to use when gambling, take a look right on over here!

And let’s move on to the stuff!

Types of Political Wagering

Let’s start with the most basic one, the one everyone would expect…

Is Trump going to win again come 2020?

This may be one of the easiest ones of the past. “Is my candidate going to win”, with almost a 50/50 chance. Those days are long gone, at least for this cycle.

Depending on who you watch for the news and for the commentary, you’ll see quite the differing viewpoints going on. You’ve got those that are convinced Trump is about to be impeached and he won’t even be in the next election. You’ve got those that are convinced that he will in fact win again in one of the biggest landslides ever, paving the way for Trump Jr. in 2024.

If you’re willing to go and take a gamble on that you’re more than welcome to go to any of the three sites mentioned above and put your money where your mouth is!

If you do in fact think that Trump will win again, as of this writing, BookMaker is giving the best odds on that although that may change at any time!

An Example of Betting on Politics

Take a look at the image above. Let’s just say, hypothetically, that I thought Trump is going to take it again in 2020. I would simply choose which bet I wanted to place and click it. Then you see the bet slip appear on the right hand side of the screen.

I would then place the amount I would like to wager, in this example $100. After that, just click the big red, “PLACE BETS” button. You can see that with the odds of +125, I would potentially win $125.

Absolutely hate Trump and a big fan of MSNBC? That’s okay, totally your decision. If you listen to them and what they like to rant about, you can flat out go and bet on whether or not ol’ man Trump is going to be impeached during his term over at Bovada.

Impeachment aside, BetOnline will give you 5% above market price for bitcoin deposits after which time the pessimist or optimist in you can wager on just flat out whether or not he’ll finish his first term!

Now Let’s Break it Down a Little More, (the Nominees)

You can bet on Trump without even thinking he’ll win the election, or even be in it!

You may believe that Trump just will not be running due to impeachment, health, dropping out, whatever. While there are no names to replace him at this time, you can still bet on whether or not his name will be on the ballot.

For example, right now at BetOnline, you can go and place your bets for the 2020 republican nominee as ‘Trump’(-500) or ‘Not Trump’(+350).

Moving Over to the Left Side

This is where things start to get a little more interesting since we just don’t know at this time who is going to be the big name on the ballot, but that doesn’t have to stop you from making your prediction!

Warren, Biden, Yang, Sanders… You’ve got all of ‘em on the betting slips and ready to go!

Once again you can go with the simple, “Will they win” (Bovada), to the “Will they even be on the ticket” (BetOnline).

Anyone but Warren is always a possibility!

As I type this, Elizabeth Warren is looking like the democrat favorite among all three of these sites, although the odds are not as good as Trump being re-elected, just sayin’. However, if you look at the image above, you’ll see something. She’s still not the fave in the sense that you can literally bet on anyone but her, at least according to BetOnline!

Once again, after clicking on exactly which bet I would like to place, the Bet Slip appears on the right hand side where I would confirm my wager. In this case and with these odds I would have to wager $100 in order to win $83 and some change.

If you fancy yourself a political activist and you don’t like the way things are looking, now is the time to act, but that’s not why we’re here!

Republicans Versus Democrats

Take a look at these odds from BookMaker. This may be the year a 3rd party wins and someone’s gonna get PAID.

Let’s be honest here. Some of you have not cared enough to look at individual candidates yet. That’s okay, BookMaker still has you covered!

You can head on over there, claim their 15% cash bonus and just flat out bet on “Republican or Democrat” and leave it at that! While waiting until election time head over to their casino where you also got a 50% bonus when you made your deposit. (If you took it and accepted it, that is!)

Even if you don’t want to go with either of the two big parties, you can bet against them both. The odds are very, very heavily, stacked against you, but absolutely crazy things have happened in the world of betting before!

Foreign Affairs

Political Betting Website

Most of you are going to be from the US. We know that a few of you aren’t. There may even be some that are from the US but are knowledgeable when it comes to the state of things when it comes to different countries.

Think you know all there is to know about the upcoming Canadian federal elections? Prove it!

You can go to BetOnline and wager on Andrew Scheer, Justin Trudeau, Jagmeet Singh, Elizabeth May, any of those Molson swilling beaver lovers!

Right now, the best odds are on Andrew Scheer. Looks like Mr. Trudeau has really porked himself as of lately, but I could be wrong. I don’t know much at all about Canadian politics, don’t take my word for squat on any of that.

Over at Bovada with their $4500 bitcoin bonus, you can bet on “Will Jair Bolsonaro Complete His First Term”. That’s something I know even less about, however, the odds look good that he will, so good for him for keeping away from the scandals that plague those of us over in the states!

Last, but not least, BookMaker will let you place some wagers on the next Jamaiican election with the People National Party up against the Jamaica Labour Party. BookMaker even has some seat handicapping on this for those that really know their stuff when it comes to the home of spicy jerk chicken and one Mr. Bob Marley.

Know anything about Jamaica that you didn’t see in a movie? I don’t! But if you do, you can go place bets in their elections!

Don’t Care Who Wins?

And there is that last group of people that don’t care who wins or don’t want to learn more about it. While this probably will not interest you, it’s still available.

You can head on over to Bovada and bet on which field the next recipient of the Presidential medal of freedom be attributed to, with the choices of

• Sports/Athletics
• Arts/Media
• Education/History
• Law/Humanitarian

And so on.

Is it possible for Trump to just give it to himself and then just start shoving people and saying, “O’Doyle rules”? That’s where I would put my money.

Conclusion… For Now…

London Betting Odds Us President

Until more information comes out, and until more decisions are made among our friends up in Washington come out, that’s pretty much what’s available in the world of betting on politics.

Those that went to school and earned themselves a degree in political sciences can go and try to make a killing.

Just kidding. The way US politics are going, hell, it’s anyone’s guess, but if you think you know how it’s all going to go, this is your chance!

Can You Bet On Politics In Las Vegas

Just make sure that when you do go, you go to one of our true, legit, safe sportsbooks to do so! Unlike many sites that will just send you off to wherever, we actually use these sportsbook ourselves to do our own personal wagering. Click on this link right here to check out more reviews from the places we visit!

Where To Bet On Politics

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