As U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Auburn) continues his gubernatorial campaign, there is little doubt that a potential state lottery will become an issue he will have to address.

While many lottery bills have been proposed in recent years in the Legislature, none of them have been able to make it past the finish line.

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Tuberville discussed the issue recently on WVNN’s “The Dale Jackson Show.”

“[I]t’s going to be up to the people,” Tuberville said. “The Legislature has got to do it first, no matter what it is, and then, of course, the Alabama people in the referendum will have to vote on this.”

The senator also argued that if Alabama ever does have some kind of lottery, he wants to make sure most of the money generated will go back to the people of the state.

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“Now I’m not going to allow people to come in and run these lottery associations,” he explained. “As I’ve been in DC, I’ve sat down with governors that are now senators, and talked to them about good and bad and different things that they’ve done. That’s one of the things they say: if your people want to pass the lottery, just make sure that the money goes to the state and not to the people running the lottery system.

“If it’s done, we’ll do it the right way. Again, it’s going to be passed by the people of Alabama, but it will be done the right way, and we’ll make some money out of it.”

Yaffee is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts “The Yaffee Program” weekdays 9-11 a.m. on WVNN. You can follow him on X @Yaffee