Light & Wonder’s Howard Glaser: ‘Transitional Year’ Ahead As Prediction Markets Advance With ‘No Barricades’ 

A few weeks after casting some warm glow via Casino Reports‘ year-end reflection — the “12 Most Impactful People In Gambling In 2025” — we checked in with one of the honorees, Howard Glaser, for a 2026 status check.

Glaser serves as global head of government affairs and legislative counsel at Nevada-based gaming supplier Light & Wonder.

In this wide-ranging interview, Glaser discussed his company’s view of the legislative landscape for this year, as well as some of the controversial platforms and products that have dominated much of the industry’s attention and energies. Namely, prediction markets.

This interview was lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

Casino Reports (CR): In 2025, it seemed that Light & Wonder and peers were prioritizing legislation to stamp out sweepstakes casinos and sportsbooks. Is that an accurate assessment of last year’s goals? And in any case, what’s the top priority policy-wise this year?

Howard Glaser (HG): For Light and Wonder as a company, it’s truly just to monitor legislative developments. Legislatures are becoming battlegrounds for struggles between different verticals in the gaming industry and because we work across so many, our position is just to monitor the developments on these different fronts and react where necessary.

As far as sweeps is concerned, I think that battle is basically over. It’s not really a viable industry in the U.S. What you’re seeing now is that the regulators themselves have picked up the ball and are driving the legislative response. So in Maine, in Iowa, in Maryland, the bills introduced on sweeps are by the regulators. That’s kind of an evolution on the sweeps side.

CR: Speaking of Maine, what’s your assessment of the development there with Gov. Mills allowing LD 1164 — “An Act to Create Economic Opportunity for the Wabanaki Nations Through Internet Gaming” — to become law, when many expected a veto?

HG: From a macro point of view, there’s clearly a consumer demand for online gaming. And for the most part, that demand is being met by illegal operators. That’s really what sweeps was about, likewise offshore platforms. So the issue has to be addressed somehow. Either there’s got to be enforcement against illegal online gaming or a path for consumers who want to play online to do that. Because it’s going to happen one way or another, whether it’s legal or illegal.

Different states will take different approaches. You’re seeing that play out in Maine and you’ve got deep divisions among [operators on] the brick-and-mortar side, where some feel they can’t benefit from online gaming. And you have the sports betting and online gaming operators who are pushing, and that’s going to play out differently in every state. But I don’t see a lot of other states moving in ‘26. I think it’ll be quite incremental until there’s a unified position within the industry. You can’t really go into a state where the brick and mortars are opposed to online gaming and expect to be successful. Generally, it’s not going to happen.

CR: Let’s see if we can muster some optimism for the pro-legalization camp. If there were one state where there might be some forward momentum this year, would you say maybe New York, Maryland, elsewhere?

HG: The one to watch is Florida. In Florida, the only game in town is the Seminole Tribe and Hard Rock, and if the Seminoles decide that they would rather have the online business than cede it to the illegal market, that will be their decision to make.

CR:  Right, Hard Rock has already dabbled in something slot-like with the historical NASCAR games, based on the existing compact language.

HG: So we’ll see if they want to take it to the next level or not, but that would be a state to watch, though it depends mostly on the Seminoles’ own decision. 

CR: At the federal level, we’re in an election year and they’ve obviously got a lot happening in a polarized environment. Meanwhile, Sens. Durbin and Britt last week published an open letter to the CDC with concerns around youth sports betting and online gambling. Do you foresee any legislation advancing in Congress, whether it be around collegiate sports, prediction markets, or otherwise? 

HG: I don’t think so. Traditionally, Congress has left it to the states. I don’t think there’s a big appetite for federal regulation of gaming at this point. I would expect we’ll see some hearings and inquiries about how that market is working and how it’s impacting consumers. The bigger issue for the federal government is how to deal with prediction markets, and it’s going to be fascinating to see that unfold.

You have the state regulators who have taken a very hard line opposed. You have a federal regulator that has left the door wide open. That has created conflict that’s playing out in the courts, in the state legislatures, and I would expect it’s going to at least be a topic of discussion in Congress at some point. Now, Light & Wonder doesn’t have a position one way or another on that, but we’re interested in seeing how it plays out.

CR: There are about a dozen legal cases playing out. Meanwhile at the state level, we saw a bill introduced in New York that would have prediction markets regulated at, yes, the state level. Kalshi et al.’s core underlying position is that the federal government is solely authorized to regulate them via the CFTC. Should we expect to see more state-based legislation like this?

HG: You’ll see more states attempt to grapple with prediction markets. That will be driven in part by the traditional gaming industry and in part by unease with a form of gambling that appears to be outside the scope of state regulation or state law, which has traditionally been the regulator. It’s really the gamification of everything potentially, right? There’s no limit on the prediction market side and, at the moment at least, it’s totally outside the scope of gaming regulation, so it poses a real challenge for state regulators. 

Consumer acceptance of the prediction market product has begun and the CFTC hasn’t put up a red light or even really a yellow light, so you know at the moment prediction markets can operate unfettered. This is going to generate a counter reaction among states that see this as their role and an attack on state sovereignty over gaming.

Indian tribes will feel that way even more so, and as hard as the tribes in California pushed back against sweeps, I would expect that to be tenfold on prediction markets.

CR: Let’s turn for a minute to social media, which obviously is not real life or an accurate barometer of public sentiment. That said, I’m seeing what strikes me as heightened backlash against sports betting, alongside lots of cheerleading for prediction markets. Does any of this reflect within the discourse on the ground in various legislatures? 

HG: The legislative process tends to awaken slowly, and I think they’re circling around to prediction markets. If you asked six months ago in most state legislatures, no one would have known what you were talking about. Now there’s some awareness. The regulatory actions have prompted that, the gaming industry efforts are prompting that.

This will be, to me, kind of a transitional year and I don’t know that you’ll see anything passed in one session, but I think you’ll see it studied, debated, and positions begin to form.

Fast forward a little bit, 18 to 24 months, and this is going be a serious market. The legislatures will probably be playing catch up at that point, and the territory will already be occupied, so you know it’s going to be a reality of life that prediction markets are here, there are no barricades in front of them at the moment, so they’re gonna continue to barrel through until someone puts up the stop sign or corrals them in.

And I’m not making a value judgment about it, because we don’t have a position. That’s just my analysis of what it looks like: The business is moving along without constraint at the federal level and the states will be several steps behind that.

CR: Do you have a parting shot for us? 

HG: There’s demand for all these types of gaming and it’s going to take time for the industry and the new potential entrants to the industry to sort it out. You’ve got a lot of different players in this. The failure to adopt online gaming opened the door to sweeps, has opened the door to prediction markets, which goes way beyond sweeps, and yet it’s happening in each of these states that have decided not to regulate online gaming. Well, they’ve got it, so now what do you do? That’s the question they have to answer and they have to navigate between all the interests, new and legacy in the gaming industry, and that is going to take some time to sort itself out.