The Mississippi Legislature passed a bill on Tuesday that aims to prevent child support money for over 150,000 Mississippi children from being gambled away, the culmination of a yearslong effort to pass such a proposal.

The House passed SB 2369 by a vote of 92-22, sending it to Gov. Tate Reeves. The bill was authored by Sen. Walter Michel, a Republican from Ridgeland. The legislation allows the Mississippi Gaming Commission and the Mississippi Department of Human Services to set up a process to withhold gambling winnings from individuals with outstanding child support.

In a statement, MDHS spokesperson Mark Jones said the agency has been pushing for four years to get this policy across the finish line.

“This is another measure that MDHS has undertaken to serve families across Mississippi,” Jones said. “We appreciate the collaboration the Gaming Commission and attorney general have offered and the willingness of the gaming industry to meet with us about this legislation. This is about parents supporting their children. Enhancing opportunities for parents to support their children is desperately needed.”

Federal data shows Mississippi has the worst child support collection rate in the nation and one of the highest rates of child poverty. The state collected just 53% of the support payments judges ordered parents to make in 2024, compared to 65% nationally, a figure that prompted Michel to work with Senate Gaming Chairman David Blount, a Democrat from Jackson, on a legislative proposal.

There are 153,964 children in Mississippi whose custodial parents are owed child support, totaling $1.7 billion, according to data obtained by Blount.

“When I heard that amount, I was just flabbergasted,” Michel said. “It’s a step in helping DHS collect these past due payments from deadbeat parents.”

The proposals would mostly impact slot machine winnings of over $2,000, Blount has said, because gaming licensees are required to report those winnings to the Internal Revenue Service. The bill explicitly targets slot machine annuities and sports betting winnings.

Similar bills had stalled in previous years because the state’s powerful casino industry did not want to be on the hook for collecting a broad range of winnings, Michel said. This time around, the legislation targeted “the right mix of winnings,” Michel said.

The bill would require the state Gaming Commission to collaborate with MDHS, the state’s welfare agency that oversees the child support program, to maintain a database of individuals with outstanding child support.

Similar laws already exist in several other states, including Louisiana. In the first nine years, the Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services intercepted an average of nearly $1 million a year from casinos, according to the National Child Support Engagement Association.