Lottery’s Explanation of December Scholarship Funding Doesn’t Make Sense

Arkansas Lottery

Recently we wrote about how the Arkansas Lottery paid very little to scholarships in December despite taking in more than $46 million.

The Arkansas Lottery notoriously budgets very little of its revenue for college scholarships, but December was particularly dismal, with students receiving only 13.8 cents out of every dollar the lottery made.

This week KNWA asked lottery officials why so little money went to scholarships last month.

KNWA writes,

They [Arkansas Lottery officials] say the lottery actually makes more money from its draw games such as Powerball and Mega Millions, but also local draws like the Natural State Jackpot and the Cash 3.

Officials say the lottery makes about 43 cents on the dollar for those, but the instant ticket games that had record sales in December don’t make as much. It varies depending on which ticket amounts are being sold. That then affects the profits, and, in turn the amount going to scholarships.

In other words, lottery officials blame the poor scholarship funding on the fact that the Lottery sold a lot of instant (i.e. scratch-off) tickets in December as opposed to Powerball tickets.

If it’s true that scratch-off tickets aren’t as profitable for the Arkansas Lottery, then why does the Lottery work so hard to promote them?

Why would they keep rolling out scratch-off tickets like the $20 ticket we wrote about in December?

If these instant tickets are actually hurting the Arkansas Lottery’s bottom line, then why does the state lottery offer more than 50 different scratch-off tickets at stores and gas stations all over Arkansas?

It simply doesn’t make sense.

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A.G.’s From Out of State Ask Court to Block Arkansas’ Pro-Life Laws

Abortion, , ,

Last week a group of 20 attorneys general filed an amicus brief with the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals as part of an effort to block three pro-life laws in Arkansas.

Last June abortionists sued the State of Arkansas over three new pro-life laws passed in 2019:

  • Act 493 of 2019, prohibiting abortion after the eighteenth week of pregnancy, except in cases of rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother.
  • Act 619 of 2019, prohibiting abortion of an unborn baby solely because the child has Down Syndrome.
  • Act 700 of 2019, requiring abortion doctors to be board certified or board eligible OB/GYNs.

A lower court in Little Rock initially blocked the laws.

However, Attorney General Leslie Rutledge has asked the federal Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals to let Arkansas enforce these good laws.

On January 7 a coalition of state attorneys general filed an amicus brief with the Eighth Circuit arguing that Act 493 and Act 619 are unconstitutional and should be struck down.

The amicus brief includes the Attorneys General of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, and the District of Columbia.

It’s worth noting that with the exception of Minnesota, none of these states are actually from the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In 2018 many of these same states tried to convince the federal courts to block other pro-life laws in Arkansas.

The amicus brief filed last week claims the State of Arkansas does not have the authority to prohibit abortion after the eighteenth week of pregnancy and that lawmakers cannot protect an unborn child from being aborted simply because he or she might have Down Syndrome.

Interestingly, the amicus brief does not say a word about Act 700 requiring abortionists to be board certified or board eligible OB/GYNs.

Apparently even these attorneys couldn’t come up with a reason why anyone besides an OB/GYN should be able to perform abortions.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I don’t know of any attorney general in America who is doing more to fight for the right to life than Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge.

Her team has won some major victories in the Eighth Circuit in past years, and I believe there will be other pro-life victories in 2020

Perhaps that’s why abortion advocates are so desperate to block pro-life laws here in Arkansas.

Photo Credit: By Brian Turner (Flickr: My Trusty Gavel) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

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