Speaker 1: Today's trip Cast is sponsored by the Texas Tribune Festival
Speaker 1: this November in downtown Austin. Hello, and welcome to the
Speaker 1: Texas Tribune trip Cast for Tuesday, April twenty ninth, twenty
Speaker 1: twenty five. This is Matthew Watkins. And if you are
Speaker 1: watching on YouTube, I am not recently homeless. I am
Speaker 1: just dressed like a slob because it's technically my day off.
Speaker 1: And fun story, eleanor my wife, Susan, who you know
Speaker 1: very well, accidentally kicked my son's door last week and
Speaker 1: shattered her pinky toe, and so we were all up
Speaker 1: at five am this morning at the outpatient surgical center
Speaker 1: getting a metal rod inserted in her toe. So this
Speaker 1: is why I look this way.
Speaker 2: That story has so many twists and turns. She accidentally
Speaker 2: kicked your son's door hard enough to break her toe, yes,
Speaker 2: in a way that required a metal rod to be
Speaker 2: put into the pinky toe.
Speaker 1: That is correct.
Speaker 3: How big of a metal rod can they put into
Speaker 3: a pinky toe?
Speaker 1: It's you know, I could show you the extra is
Speaker 1: very very very small. Yeah, maybe more of a metal
Speaker 1: pin I guess is actually would be a better way
Speaker 1: of putting it. But yeah, so careful when you're walking
Speaker 1: around in the dark after putting your kids to sleep. Everyone, seriously,
Speaker 1: you might have to get a metal rod.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So that voice, as you know, is Eleanor Kleimanoff.
Speaker 3: Hello Eleanor, Hello Matthew.
Speaker 1: So I have two other other things to report to you.
Speaker 1: Thing Number one is that I was talking to someone
Speaker 1: today who will be not named, who mentioned that they
Speaker 1: really enjoyed Eleanor's podcast.
Speaker 3: Oh amazing love that.
Speaker 2: As on Twitter some people, some people are calling it
Speaker 2: the clib.
Speaker 3: Cast, which I think is great, and it just it's
Speaker 3: not because Matthew is not equally important.
Speaker 2: It's just because his last name doesn't easily translate to
Speaker 2: the name of a podcast.
Speaker 3: No, Yeah, that's that's very funny.
Speaker 1: The second thing you actually know about but pretend like
Speaker 1: you don't, which is that listeners of the trip Cast
Speaker 1: may remember our guests last week, Patrick's v Tech who
Speaker 1: joined us, who said the thing he missed the most
Speaker 1: about Texas was AGB and then as he was signing off,
Speaker 1: shouted out, send tortillas. And I'm happy to report that
Speaker 1: our friends at AGB did, in fact send Patrick's v
Speaker 1: Tech tortillas and other AGB goodies. So what a heartwarming story.
Speaker 1: That's the impact we talk about when we talk about
Speaker 1: our journalism. I congratulations to Patrick.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I love that. And I just do want
Speaker 3: to say, like, if anyone from.
Speaker 2: I don't know, like a car company is listening, I
Speaker 2: miss your Carses Mercedes. Yes, I have an update Matthew
Speaker 2: for you, which you also know about, but you're going
Speaker 2: to pretend like you don't, which is that After we
Speaker 2: did last week's episode on the race between John Cornan
Speaker 2: and attorned General Ken Paxton, I ran into Senator John
Speaker 2: Cornyn at the airport. I advised him to, you know,
Speaker 2: give the podcast a listen, share if you had any thoughts.
Speaker 2: We invited him on, as we invite you know, everyone
Speaker 2: anyone in Texas politics that wants to join us on
Speaker 2: the podcast to be on. He very politely took my
Speaker 2: card and said he would pass it on to his assistant.
Speaker 2: So we stand by awaiting an RSVP from Senator Cornyn
Speaker 2: to join us on the podcast.
Speaker 1: The ball is in your court, yeah, John Corn's assistant. Yes,
Speaker 1: I think I think the only assumption that we could
Speaker 1: make if he doesn't join is that the assistant dropped
Speaker 1: the ball, and not at all that the Senator would
Speaker 1: not want to join our fine podcast.
Speaker 3: Right, not at all.
Speaker 2: That he put that card in his pocket and probably
Speaker 2: promptly sent those pants the dry cleaner and never thought
Speaker 2: of it again.
Speaker 3: But I had a nice time chatting with him.
Speaker 2: So if you would like to come on, and then,
Speaker 2: you know, consider that also an open invitation to Attorney
Speaker 2: General Paxton to join us as well.
Speaker 1: All right, yeah, okay, Well this has been good. I
Speaker 1: think I think that's enough for the podcast all day. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: So this week we are going to talk about the
Speaker 1: Texas Lottery. It's been an issue that has been gaining
Speaker 1: steam all legislative session, and during this session, when he's
Speaker 1: not presiding over the Texas Senate, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick
Speaker 1: has been doing his best Marvin Zindler impression, showing up
Speaker 1: unannounced at stores and a state agency office to expose
Speaker 1: what he's portrayed as a growing scandal in the Texas Lottery.
Speaker 1: You know, this is a kind of a political atmosphere
Speaker 1: these days of dark rhetoric and fear, but this has
Speaker 1: actually been a pretty fun, old fashioned political scandal. It
Speaker 1: includes accusations of stolen jackpot store clerks preventing Dan Patrick
Speaker 1: from entering mysterious back rooms. In multiple resignations of state officials,
Speaker 1: We're likely to see a shake up of the agency
Speaker 1: that funds Texas Eduction later this year the Texas Lottery Commission.
Speaker 1: Here to talk about this is Aiden Runnells, a general
Speaker 1: assignment reporter for the Texas Tribune. We recently hired Aiden
Speaker 1: for those who are not familiar from the Las Vegas Sun,
Speaker 1: where I believe they never wrote a single story about gambling.
Speaker 1: But since we hired Aiden here, Aiden has written ten
Speaker 1: stories on the topic and they've been great stories to watch.
Speaker 4: So welcome Aiden, thank you for having me. And yeah,
Speaker 4: it's a it's an irony that you pointed out one
Speaker 4: of our meetings, and I just can't believe that I
Speaker 4: almost avoided doing gambling coverage in Las Vegas because it's
Speaker 4: so complex, and then now that I'm here, it's like
Speaker 4: half of my brain is just lottery.
Speaker 3: It's pretty simple here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but it's but it's it's been. It's a
Speaker 1: pretty fun story to be involved in. You Yeah, all right,
Speaker 1: all right, Well, Aiden has been doing a great job,
Speaker 1: so thank you for that. And let's just start here.
Speaker 1: I really struggled with where to start, because there's so
Speaker 1: much to this story. These a lot of complicated different
Speaker 1: things here, But I'm going to start with just a
Speaker 1: very simple question, Aiden, can you tell us what is
Speaker 1: a lottery courier?
Speaker 4: Of course, of course, So a lottery courier is a
Speaker 4: website or an app in which customers can can go
Speaker 4: on to it and order draw games, which is the
Speaker 4: games where you pick your numbers or a scratch ticket,
Speaker 4: And somewhere in the state, usually in Austin or some
Speaker 4: in San Antonio, there is a storefront that will print
Speaker 4: the ticket that you order. They will physically scan it
Speaker 4: on usually like a Xerox scanner, and then send you
Speaker 4: a picture of that lottery ticket. And if it's a
Speaker 4: winner under six hundred dollars, they'll just cash you the
Speaker 4: money through the app, and if it's over six hundred dollars,
Speaker 4: they'll actually mail you that ticket so you can cash
Speaker 4: it in yourself. So that's what it is on its
Speaker 4: simplest terms.
Speaker 2: So like I could play the lottery from my couch,
Speaker 2: even though as I understand it, right under state law,
Speaker 2: I'm supposed to have to go in in person.
Speaker 4: Yes, oh yeah, so yeah, you can order it pretty
Speaker 4: much anywhere within the state of Texas. Most of the
Speaker 4: apps have like geolocation, and many will require like scanning
Speaker 4: of your ID and facial scan But yes, you can
Speaker 4: order it from anywhere within the state of Texas. But
Speaker 4: the only restrictions on buying it in Texas from the
Speaker 4: apps are from the apps themselves. There's no law saying,
Speaker 4: you know, an app has to have that state restriction.
Speaker 4: But there is a state restriction on buying lottery tickets.
Speaker 4: You have to be in the state when you buy
Speaker 4: the ticket.
Speaker 1: Interesting, okay, And so this is a sort of novel
Speaker 1: approach that has gotten a lot of attention in recent years,
Speaker 1: specifically related to two kind of jackpots that have been
Speaker 1: awarded or not awarded. I guess in recent years won
Speaker 1: a ninety five million dollar prize in twenty twenty three
Speaker 1: and another one for eighty four million dollars this year.
Speaker 1: Let's start with the ninety five million dollar prize in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. Tell us what happened with this individual
Speaker 1: prize and why lawmakers may or may not be upset
Speaker 1: about it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely so. In April of twenty twenty three, what
Speaker 4: we now know from a combination reporting from Eric dex
Speaker 4: Sheimer with Houston Chronicle and a team at the Wall
Speaker 4: Street Journal. Two overseas gamblers worked with several companies in
Speaker 4: the state of Texas to order roughly fifty lottery terminals
Speaker 4: which prints lottery tickets, distributed them across four storefronts, some
Speaker 4: of which didn't really sell products. I think one of
Speaker 4: them sold cooozies and boating trips in Montana and printed
Speaker 4: ninety nine percent of the possible ticket combinations over a
Speaker 4: three day period. And so that roughly amounted to about
Speaker 4: two point five million physical tickets to essentially game that
Speaker 4: jackpot and win ninety five million dollars. And this was
Speaker 4: done with communication with the top lottery official at the time,
Speaker 4: former Executive Director Gary Grief.
Speaker 1: What do you mean by with communication?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so from what we know, there were emails and records,
Speaker 4: emails and requests from the groups that were trying to
Speaker 4: sort of put the scheme together that said, you know,
Speaker 4: if we come and we order these terminals within under
Speaker 4: your process, is this legal?
Speaker 3: Is this illegal?
Speaker 4: And what Gary what Grief it said at the time,
Speaker 4: and what lawmakers had maintained up until about February of
Speaker 4: this year is we have no purview over lottery couriers,
Speaker 4: which what they meant by that is current law says
Speaker 4: that you can't play the game by telephone, and so
Speaker 4: telephone they took to mean physically, you know, ordering over
Speaker 4: the phone, like making a phone call, Yes, making a
Speaker 4: phone call. And so what they told couriers in including
Speaker 4: one courier that was involved in this bulk purchase lottery
Speaker 4: dot Com and other couriers which describe themselves as legitimate couriers,
Speaker 4: is that because we have no purview, as long as
Speaker 4: you're not running the store yourself, you know, you don't
Speaker 4: need a license. So what these some of these companies
Speaker 4: would do is they have LLCs that are owned by
Speaker 4: the same parent company. They would operate these stores, request
Speaker 4: the lottery terminals install them throughout, and then print the
Speaker 4: tickets that way.
Speaker 2: So essentially, like someone went to the state and was like, Hey,
Speaker 2: we are going to scam the lottery.
Speaker 3: Is that legal? And they said, like, we technically have
Speaker 3: no grounds in which to stop you.
Speaker 4: It was in a little bit more vague terms than that,
Speaker 4: and from my understanding for I've talked with some former
Speaker 4: lottery officials who told me it was very much a
Speaker 4: top heavy operation. So Gary Grief was in contact, you know,
Speaker 4: limited capacity with these groups, but very little other people
Speaker 4: were in contact with these groups, so they sort of
Speaker 4: flagged that this was going to happen, and they sort
Speaker 4: of turned a blind eye.
Speaker 1: All right, So, I mean basically what we're talking about
Speaker 1: here is where these couriers are creating a system that
Speaker 1: allows people to buy massive amounts of tickets, whether that's
Speaker 1: scratch offs or or lotto like right like pick number tickets. Right.
Speaker 4: So this is where sort of some of the confusion
Speaker 4: has occurred in hearings with lawmakers is So there was
Speaker 4: a courier company involved in the bulk purchase lottery dot com,
Speaker 4: but in Texas at that point they actually hadn't sold
Speaker 4: a ticket in months, but they used their store to
Speaker 4: facilitate this bulk purchase. So no purchase for the for
Speaker 4: the bulk purchase, as they've described it, nothing was done
Speaker 4: through the app. The administrators of the company just said
Speaker 4: we're going to print it ourselves. And a lot of
Speaker 4: courier apps right now that exist do have limits on
Speaker 4: like you can't buy more than a thousand tickets in
Speaker 4: a day. But the same infrastructure was used for this
Speaker 4: bulk purchase.
Speaker 2: So there's two problems, right, There's there's bulk purchasing. In
Speaker 2: the eyes of lawmakers, right, the problems are bulk purchasing,
Speaker 2: and then the other problem is couriers, and couriers can
Speaker 2: in some cases facilitate bulk purchase exactly. Yeah, but lawmakers
Speaker 2: have a problem with couriers, even if it's just me
Speaker 2: myself trying to buy one ticket.
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, I understand.
Speaker 1: What do we know about the person or people who
Speaker 1: made this bulk purchase that allowed them to win supposedly
Speaker 1: ninety five million dollars.
Speaker 4: We know very little about the people. We know from
Speaker 4: the Wall Street Journal article that one of the gamblers,
Speaker 4: whose name is escaping me right now, it was very
Speaker 4: experienced in going to lotteries and sort of using the
Speaker 4: odds in order to you know, win large jackpots. As
Speaker 4: far as the companies we know again, lottery dot Com
Speaker 4: was sort of one of the big facilitators. Their company
Speaker 4: was at one point a legitimate lottery courier service that
Speaker 4: had sold tickets online mostly I think through a website,
Speaker 4: and they worked with this these two gamblers to basically,
Speaker 4: you know, facilitate the bulk purchase because they already have
Speaker 4: the machines, and they figured, if we partner with some
Speaker 4: other retailers, we can get go from you know, twelve
Speaker 4: lottery terminals to again. I think the final number they
Speaker 4: had was about fifty in order to facilitate the means
Speaker 4: necessary to print you know, two point five million tickets
Speaker 4: twenty five million combinations in a three day period.
Speaker 3: It's good, such a crazy little little scheme.
Speaker 4: It would make a good movie one day, or a
Speaker 4: limited Apple TV show exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So okay, Now let's talk about the eighty four
Speaker 1: million dollar purchase that has lawmaker's attention this year. Tell
Speaker 1: us about that one.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so that one has a lot less I guess
Speaker 4: suspicion around it. Basically, Texas woman who has remained anonymous
Speaker 4: as most jackpot winners over a million dollars tend to
Speaker 4: do purchase ten tickets through the nation's largest career at Jackpocket,
Speaker 4: and so she bought ten tickets. One of them was
Speaker 4: the eighty three point five at roughly eighty four million
Speaker 4: dollar jackpot bought at The ticket itself was printed at
Speaker 4: Winner's Corner, which is a retail store that sells board
Speaker 4: games in Austin that has now become famous because of
Speaker 4: two appearances by our Lieutenant governor in videos he's on
Speaker 4: X and so she bought those with as legally as
Speaker 4: someone who can buy a ticket through a courier can.
Speaker 3: She went to.
Speaker 4: Try to redeem the ticket in a march alongside her lawyer,
Speaker 4: and the Lottery Commission told her, no, we're not giving
Speaker 4: you that that jackpot until we're done investigating the win,
Speaker 4: which the Attorney General's Office and the Texas Rangers are
Speaker 4: currently investigating the lottery Commission and their proliferation of couriers.
Speaker 1: All right, So these two cases have exposed, as Eleanor
Speaker 1: sort of mentioned, two different problems through the eyes of lawmakers.
Speaker 1: The one the practice of both purchasing. I think we
Speaker 1: can all sort of understand why lawmakers might not like that, right, Like,
Speaker 1: if you're playing the odds, I think in the I
Speaker 1: think it was the ninety five million dollar one, right
Speaker 1: your one of your previous stories said they spent about
Speaker 1: twenty six million dollars buying you know, almost all of
Speaker 1: the different possible combinations for that lotto pick, which then
Speaker 1: you know, guaranteed them to win what like some fifty
Speaker 1: something million dollars after tax and that right.
Speaker 4: So that fifty four million was just like the main prize.
Speaker 4: I went back and looked, and they also won another
Speaker 4: extra one or two million in the lower prizes as
Speaker 4: well from redeeming those smaller prizes.
Speaker 1: So you know, that's not fair, and there are a
Speaker 1: lot of people who were playing kind of honestly in
Speaker 1: that who might have lost the opportunity to win a jackpot.
Speaker 1: And also, presumably you have to have a lot of
Speaker 1: sort of startup capital in order to buy twenty six
Speaker 1: million lottery tickets, So I can see why the Texas
Speaker 1: legislature might not be crazy about that practice. Why do
Speaker 1: they not like the practice of buying these tickets really
Speaker 1: the phone? I mean, you know, presumably you know or not?
Speaker 1: Presumably it is is publicly stated the reason that the
Speaker 1: lottery was created was to fund education programs in the state.
Speaker 1: Buying them via the phone would presumably allow more tickets
Speaker 1: to be purchased and more education to be funded in Texas.
Speaker 1: So what's the problem here?
Speaker 4: Yeah, So the first argument is that it's not in
Speaker 4: the spirit of the lottery, and that goes back to
Speaker 4: that law that we mentioned about not being able to
Speaker 4: purchase it by telephone and So during the very long
Speaker 4: February twenty fourth State Affairs hearing, there was a point
Speaker 4: where Senator Mays Middleton asked, you know, do you feel
Speaker 4: they asked courier executives. Three of them went to testify,
Speaker 4: you know, do you feel like you're breaking the law?
Speaker 4: And they responded, you know currently or we don't violate
Speaker 4: any of the statutes, and sort of that open up
Speaker 4: conversation about sort of circumventing it based off very fine language.
Speaker 4: So part of it is the spirit. Another concern with
Speaker 4: both the bulk purchase and couriers is that the regulation
Speaker 4: that careers currently have, for example, the geolocation, the facial
Speaker 4: ID scanning, all of that is done basically at the
Speaker 4: goodwill of the couriers. Because there's no regulation right now,
Speaker 4: it could open up for illegal purchases to miners. You know,
Speaker 4: if a child grabs their parents' cell phone and then
Speaker 4: buys a ticket that's already like pre approved through the
Speaker 4: app purchases out of state. I mean, you know, if
Speaker 4: VPNs are used to trick the geolocation, I don't know
Speaker 4: if any instances, but I know that's something that lawmakers
Speaker 4: have been worried about. And then money laundering was another
Speaker 4: concern about buying tickets, and that goes more to the
Speaker 4: bulk purchase. But I think really the illegal sales to
Speaker 4: miners and out of state are the big concerns about
Speaker 4: couriers specifically.
Speaker 2: I mean, how much of this is just like I imagine
Speaker 2: least some of these lawmakers. We have like a pretty
Speaker 2: conservative and in many cases conservative Christian.
Speaker 3: Legislature.
Speaker 2: Obviously, I think some of our lawmakers are at least
Speaker 2: you know, their priority sort of focus around like morality
Speaker 2: and Christianity things like that.
Speaker 3: Does that come into play at all? Is there's sort
Speaker 3: of just like a distaste for the lottery these days?
Speaker 4: Absolutely, I would say, you know, there was a hearing
Speaker 4: in which one representative called the Texas lottery I think
Speaker 4: they called Texas the state's biggest bookie. And so there
Speaker 4: is definitely also like a natural disdain for the lottery,
Speaker 4: and I think you see that as you know, calls
Speaker 4: for the lottery to be abolished outright, there were sort
Speaker 4: of just a few people saying that right from the outset.
Speaker 4: But now that's sort of a really picked up steam
Speaker 4: as we've gotten later into the session and as things
Speaker 4: keep happening resignations keep being filed and so on and
Speaker 4: so forth. So I think there's definitely the disdain for
Speaker 4: gambling in general, I think has definitely bled over into
Speaker 4: the lottery. And there are big gaming interests in the lottery.
Speaker 4: The jack Pocket, the company that sold that eighty four
Speaker 4: million dollar jackpot ticket, they're owned by DraftKings, which is,
Speaker 4: you know, one of the largest sports gambling companies in
Speaker 4: the world. So there's definitely a lot of the ven diagram.
Speaker 1: There is very wide. Yeah, I mean, it's it's you know,
Speaker 1: worth noting that this conversation is happening during a time
Speaker 1: where a lot of gambling interests are spending massive amounts
Speaker 1: of money trying to lobby the legislature to push to
Speaker 1: legalize sports gambling or online gambling or casinos in Texas.
Speaker 1: And Dan Patrick, who's been one of the sort of
Speaker 1: leading voices criticizing you know, the lottery, has has been
Speaker 1: very resistant to that idea too. Right, So, so the
Speaker 1: the ideology here, you know, aligns in that kind of way.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit more about the
Speaker 1: legislative response to this, but first let's pause and hear
Speaker 1: from our sponsor, Deliver Texas Sized insight at your next
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Speaker 1: coming up this November thirteenth through fifteen. Tickets to the
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Speaker 1: May first, so purchase them now at Texastribune dot org. Okay, Aiden,
Speaker 1: you have spent a lot of time sitting in committee hearings,
Speaker 1: hearing the discussion of this. What is the legislative response?
Speaker 1: What might we see come out of the capital in
Speaker 1: response to these scandals that have hit the lottery Commission?
Speaker 4: Yeah? So, I think the big one that's gotten a
Speaker 4: lot of coverage is Cenatebill twenty eight, which is one
Speaker 4: of Dan Patrick's priorities, which would criminalize couriers entirely, So
Speaker 4: would explicitly ban internet sales of lottery t ticket purchases
Speaker 4: and make it, I believe, a class A misdemeanor. But
Speaker 4: there's there's also uh, there's also a bill that would
Speaker 4: ban both purchases. I believe that was authored by Senator
Speaker 4: Hughes that would just say if you buy all the tickets,
Speaker 4: then you know that's illegal and we're not going to
Speaker 4: pay out your jackpot. But right now I think the
Speaker 4: lottery itself is in a very treacherous spot on its own.
Speaker 4: Uh that will require I think legislative input in order
Speaker 4: to fix. You know, the current House budget proposal strip
Speaker 4: the lottery of all of its funding to zero, and
Speaker 4: so you know that can get put back in conference committee.
Speaker 4: But at the same time, the lottery is under sunset review,
Speaker 4: which means that they're going enough to pass a bill
Speaker 4: in order to continue the agency's existence. And so far
Speaker 4: that neither there's two sunset bills, one in the House
Speaker 4: one on the Senate. Neither has gotten a hearing so far.
Speaker 4: So those are the two big things. There's also some
Speaker 4: other restrictions on being proposed about how much retailers can
Speaker 4: get paid because right now they get about five percent
Speaker 4: cut of the ticket sales. Some people want to increase that,
Speaker 4: some people want to decrease that. There's a bill that
Speaker 4: would you know, sort of restrict how much a jackpot
Speaker 4: can get paid out relative to how much is being
Speaker 4: donated to the Education fund, so it's sort of rebalance
Speaker 4: that proportion. So there's a lot of little things, but
Speaker 4: I think the two big things right now really are
Speaker 4: the courier ban, which unanimously passed in the Senate, and
Speaker 4: then again whether they're going to, you know, let the
Speaker 4: lottery have its money back.
Speaker 3: What what does the lottery fund in Texas?
Speaker 4: So the lottery funds to primary things, the education education,
Speaker 4: I think their education a yearly. I forget the name
Speaker 4: of the fund right now, but it gets about two
Speaker 4: billion a year in funding K twelve education, Yes, K
Speaker 4: through twelve public education gets about two billion dollars, give
Speaker 4: or take. And then they also have several millions of
Speaker 4: dollars a year that go to veterans programs. So they
Speaker 4: have a specific game that goes to the proceeds go
Speaker 4: to veteran charities and things like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm so.
Speaker 2: I'm from Georgia originally, and Georgia has a like program,
Speaker 2: and the lottery is how they fund what they call
Speaker 2: the Hope Scholarship, which basically says, if you have I
Speaker 2: think it's like a B plus average in high school,
Speaker 2: you can go to any state university for free. And
Speaker 2: it's been like this huge program to really sort of
Speaker 2: keep people in in Georgia, keep people in state, keep
Speaker 2: them going to school there.
Speaker 3: I mean you go to the University of Georgia, Georgia Tech.
Speaker 2: It often is criticized, I think because it you know,
Speaker 2: it does there's no income requirement, so it sometimes goes
Speaker 2: people who maybe could afford to go there, but they
Speaker 2: want to keep those people in state. So the lottery
Speaker 2: there is very enmeshed in like that Hope Scholarship. I
Speaker 2: mean that two billion dollars to education, Like despite our
Speaker 2: recent investments in education here in Texas, I think imagine
Speaker 2: people kind of want to there's a motivation to keep
Speaker 2: that money coming in.
Speaker 4: I think one of the most interesting things I've heard
Speaker 4: in these hearings is actually, Lawmick, you're sort of writing
Speaker 4: off that two billion during the first hearing that had
Speaker 4: the lottery, and at the February twelfth Senate Finance hearing,
Speaker 4: I think somebody said like, oh, well, that amounts to
Speaker 4: about two three days of public education, and so we
Speaker 4: could do we could do with that. I think Senator
Speaker 4: Perry said, we're addicted to the dollars. So there is
Speaker 4: some sort of you know, conflict on how badly. We
Speaker 4: really do need the two billion dollars. But I was surprised,
Speaker 4: I think personally, to hear people saying they're willing to
Speaker 4: lose that money if it means getting rid of you know,
Speaker 4: what they call a corrupt agency.
Speaker 3: Right, I mean, we just put all this money to
Speaker 3: public education.
Speaker 2: So I guess you could, you know, you could say, like,
Speaker 2: you know, it evens out in the end. You add some,
Speaker 2: you take some back, and that's the public education story.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Also among this is you know, charitable Bingo is also
Speaker 4: a game that runs under the Texas Lottery Commission, and
Speaker 4: they're sort of being held hostage amid all of this confusion.
Speaker 4: There is a bill right now in this Senate that
Speaker 4: would sort of life flight the Bingo Commission out of
Speaker 4: the Texas Lotteries priview and put it under the I
Speaker 4: think the Department of Licensing and Regulation. So I think
Speaker 4: it'll be interesting to see that bill as well, you know,
Speaker 4: whether or not the lottery stays, to see how much
Speaker 4: they trust the agency going forward if they move this
Speaker 4: you know game to another agency entirely.
Speaker 1: Aiden you talk about kind of trusting the agency, I mean,
Speaker 1: the agency has been under a significant amount of heat
Speaker 1: this legislative session. It has been interesting to watch kind
Speaker 1: of their response. Right you had the Commission sort of
Speaker 1: saying we can't regulate these couriers, and then the legislature
Speaker 1: getting mad at them and then sort of being like, well, actually,
Speaker 1: maybe we can legislate these careers been there have been
Speaker 1: a couple resignations. Can you help me kind of understand,
Speaker 1: like how much of this is you know, neglect or
Speaker 1: poor management by an agency and how much of is
Speaker 1: just like them not having the tools, whether it's you know,
Speaker 1: statute saying you can't do this, or any kind of
Speaker 1: enforcement capability to prevent these things that lawmakers don't like
Speaker 1: from happening.
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, I think a lot of it is that agency
Speaker 4: sort of you know, I don't know if I have
Speaker 4: the authority right now based on my reporting to say
Speaker 4: outright malpractice, but you know, they did on February twenty
Speaker 4: fourth announce that they would start censuring any retail stores
Speaker 4: that we're partnering with couriers, And that was done the
Speaker 4: monday before. They were in two different hearings, hearings, one
Speaker 4: of them being on Senate Bill twenty eight. So they
Speaker 4: sort of turned on its head after years of saying, oh, well,
Speaker 4: we have no purview over these couriers, we can't regulate them,
Speaker 4: we need to wait for an opinion from the Attorney
Speaker 4: General's office to suddenly saying, actually, if you're with these,
Speaker 4: you know, if you're partnering with these couriers, we're going
Speaker 4: to pass a rule saying you're gonna have your license
Speaker 4: revote revoked. The vote finalizing that rule actually happens today
Speaker 4: on Tuesday, and so I don't think there's any expectations
Speaker 4: about there being contention. I think it's expected to pass
Speaker 4: pretty easily and unanimously. But it really does come down
Speaker 4: to I think the agency either not wanting to or
Speaker 4: just not feeling the need to regulate these until it
Speaker 4: reached ahead. Could there have been legislation, you know, that
Speaker 4: could have attacked this problem earlier? I mean Senator Hall
Speaker 4: had I think was Senate Bill eighteen twenty last legislative session.
Speaker 4: That was exactly it is what Senate Bill twenty eight
Speaker 4: is now. So there was an attempt. This wasn't a
Speaker 4: problem that is completely blindsided. Lawmakers have been having conversations
Speaker 4: about this in public hearing since twenty twenty two, so
Speaker 4: I guess there is some culpability there in not recognizing
Speaker 4: it as a problem that would grow, and sales among
Speaker 4: curriers have grown a lot too in those few years.
Speaker 1: Aden you with the lawyer of the woman who won
Speaker 1: the eighty four million dollar jackpot that she has not
Speaker 1: been able to collect yet, tell me a little bit
Speaker 1: about her situation. I mean, that's a lot of money
Speaker 1: at stake for one individual person here.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So from my understanding, she's just a normal woman
Speaker 4: in somewhere in Texas. Her lawyer wouldn't tell me where,
Speaker 4: and she just played on jackpocket because she didn't like
Speaker 4: going to the gas station alone, and so she just
Speaker 4: bought ten tickets on the app and one big and
Speaker 4: then you know, got a lawyer, as many people who
Speaker 4: win these jackpots do, and they took the ticket from
Speaker 4: her and sort of lying in wait. The lawyer when
Speaker 4: I when I talked to him, he said, they're waiting
Speaker 4: on litigation. It's not an impossibility they may sue to take,
Speaker 4: you know, to get this winning that she as it
Speaker 4: appears she'd of a fair winning ticket. But I think
Speaker 4: there's also some hope that those two investigations will wrap
Speaker 4: up sooner rather than later, and she'll just get her
Speaker 4: money and be on her way. So there's some optimism happening.
Speaker 2: Can you imagine like playing the lottery for years not winning,
Speaker 2: and you finally win, like at the at the exact
Speaker 2: moment that the wind changes on this and now you're
Speaker 2: like eighty three million dollars just.
Speaker 3: Waiting for you.
Speaker 1: It's really an amazing confluence of great luck and terrible luck.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yes, I honestly feel like you.
Speaker 2: She must be like, maybe the universe doesn't want me
Speaker 2: to have this money, like there's something is in my way.
Speaker 4: There's a there's another lawsuit I don't think has other
Speaker 4: people have written about it. It's smaller where the man
Speaker 4: who won the Lotto Texas jackpot after the ninety five
Speaker 4: million dollar purchase is suing the Texas Lottery Commission saying, well,
Speaker 4: they won by cheating, so that should have been my
Speaker 4: money that should have never been paid out. So there's
Speaker 4: sueing the company that won the ninety five million purchase
Speaker 4: saying well, I think that money belongs to me because
Speaker 4: you cheated, And so he wants one hundred million dollars.
Speaker 2: Sames, I would also like us to be sponsored by
Speaker 2: one hundred million dollars one hundred million dollars.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. So there's one last thing I want to
Speaker 1: cover on this, which is the the Dan Patrick web show.
Speaker 1: I mentioned earlier at the start that he's been doing
Speaker 1: his best Marvin Zindler impression. I will ask y'all later
Speaker 1: whether either of you know who Marvin Zindler is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I keep laughing, but I'm gonna be honest, I'm
Speaker 2: not sure.
Speaker 1: Reference Okay, We're going to save that to the ends
Speaker 1: because I want to talk a little bit about this.
Speaker 1: This is basically he has been making videos, posting them
Speaker 1: on social media right where he shows up and interviews
Speaker 1: people involved in this, including at the store winners Corner
Speaker 1: that we've already mentioned. Just describe for us briefly these
Speaker 1: these videos aiden because I'm really enjoying them.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean so when the first one came out,
Speaker 4: I was just stounded. So Dan Patrick is standing outside
Speaker 4: of this storefront, and I've been to several of these
Speaker 4: storefronts myself and they're really not that large. So he
Speaker 4: starts filming in front of the storefront. Then he goes
Speaker 4: inside and sort of questions the uh, you know, the
Speaker 4: manager as it were. That's at like the cashier register
Speaker 4: and saying like, can I see the back? These are?
Speaker 4: You know, you guys sell board games. That's kind of strange.
Speaker 4: In his latest video, he actually swabs one of the
Speaker 4: board games for dust to.
Speaker 1: Point out I would like to I would like to
Speaker 1: clarify too, which who who among us doesn't have a
Speaker 1: seller of baton board game gathering dusts.
Speaker 3: That's gonna say a dusty settlers a katan.
Speaker 4: And so you know he in the first video, he uh,
Speaker 4: you know, has sort of a back and forth with
Speaker 4: the manager and then they get a lawyer on the phone,
Speaker 4: and then he mentions that they actually did get to
Speaker 4: see the back this time. I think in his latest
Speaker 4: video they didn't. I thought was interesting. His latest video,
Speaker 4: he also took a visit to the Texas Lottery Commission
Speaker 4: itself and he was like, well, their office is empty,
Speaker 4: and I have to give props to his camera person
Speaker 4: because there's a shot in there of there's like a
Speaker 4: whole bunch of frames of lottery officials and there's one
Speaker 4: right in the middle that's missing from the lottery director
Speaker 4: who resigned on last Monday. And they did just a
Speaker 4: little like something out of the office, like a little
Speaker 4: zoom just done too the empty part and then back
Speaker 4: over to Patrick as he keeps sort of giving his monologues.
Speaker 4: So it's there's a good amount of production that's gone
Speaker 4: into I think there's some like side transitions and things.
Speaker 4: So whenever I went out and visited these stores, I
Speaker 4: think I told my editor I was doing my best
Speaker 4: Dan Patrick impression, trying to live true to form.
Speaker 2: No, I mean Patrick's been doing this a lot, Like
Speaker 2: he did this to a THHC store which carded him, right, yeah,
Speaker 2: and they they carded him as per you know your
Speaker 2: you know the regulation requires, So yeah, he's getting out there,
Speaker 2: getting out to people.
Speaker 1: I watched these I watched the one at Winter's Corner
Speaker 1: before we came on, and it's just like, I have
Speaker 1: such sympathy and agony for this this store manager who's
Speaker 1: like he's like calling up his boss. He's like, the
Speaker 1: Lieutenant governor wants me to show him behind this door,
Speaker 1: and you know, I guess like they cut off then,
Speaker 1: and clearly whoever he called on the phone like told
Speaker 1: them not to let the Lieutenant governor back, which is
Speaker 1: just like, oh man, this is I feel terrible for you.
Speaker 1: Patrick is in his in all fairness, like very nice
Speaker 1: to this guy and like sort of says like, I
Speaker 1: recognize you're just doing your job here, but high comedy. Okay,
Speaker 1: So Marvin Zendler, Aiden, did you look up Marvin Zendler?
Speaker 1: We were talking about it in slacks I did. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: So Marvin Zindler, are you familiar Eleanor with the musical
Speaker 1: best little whorehouse in Texas? Yes? I am so. For
Speaker 1: for over a century, the Chicken Ranch, a brothel in Lagrain, Texas,
Speaker 1: popular among Texas A and M students back in the day,
Speaker 1: I understand.
Speaker 3: Back in the day.
Speaker 1: How back back in the day. Yes, it no longer exists.
Speaker 1: For the record, I went to Texas A and M
Speaker 1: well after nineteen seventy three when Marvin Zimmler, a TV
Speaker 1: reporter for Eyewitness News in Houston, showed up to bust
Speaker 1: the Chicken Ranch. He is this sort of flamboyant legend
Speaker 1: of Houston television, most known for his sort of you
Speaker 1: know what is it? Sort of stake out journalism. He
Speaker 1: helped get the Chicken Ranch shut down and then did
Speaker 1: some reporting on how it was allowed to operate for
Speaker 1: so long, where he got into a confrontation with the
Speaker 1: Fayette County sheriff at the time, who apparently broke two
Speaker 1: of his ribs and ripped his two pay off his
Speaker 1: head in the confrontation. The film from that was destroyed
Speaker 1: in the confrontation, but Katie r. A K kept the
Speaker 1: audio and yes, Marvin Zendler his legendary sign off Marvin
Speaker 1: Zendler eyewitness news classic. So look it up.
Speaker 3: I love that. That's a classic Texas story.
Speaker 2: Yes, and I mean sort of relatedly, we should mention
Speaker 2: it's funny timing we're doing this now. You mentioned Eric
Speaker 2: dex Sheimer from He's a Chronicle who really broke this
Speaker 2: story initially about the bulk purchase sound. He just over
Speaker 2: the weekend was named the Texas Managing Editors Reporter of
Speaker 2: the Year, which really restores some dignity to the title
Speaker 2: base after a really low point for it last year
Speaker 2: when I was the Star report for the year.
Speaker 3: So Eric dex Seimer.
Speaker 5: By the way, by the way, I just like I
Speaker 5: want to congratulate Eric Eric dex Sheimer, which was not
Speaker 5: at all a venue to mentioned that I was text
Speaker 5: managing Editor's reported.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, Okay, Eleanor we're going to need
Speaker 1: you to work on your Marvin Zindler like sign off
Speaker 1: For next week's podcast, see if you can workshop some
Speaker 1: things moving forward here. But that's about all that we
Speaker 1: are going to do today. Thank you to Aiden for
Speaker 1: your great reporting on this topic. Thank you to Rob
Speaker 1: and Chris are producers and rob our theme music composer.
Speaker 1: We will talk to you all next week.