Tucumán Legislator Proposes Province-Wide Ban on Online Betting

^{A bill introduced in Tucumán's provincial legislature would ban online gambling and sports betting across the province. (Photo: Legislatura de Tucumán / Wikimedia Commons)}

Argentina's patchwork of provincial gambling rules has gained a new entry, after Alfredo Toscano, second vice-president of the Tucumán Legislature, introduced a bill that would prohibit online gambling and sports betting across the entire province. Toscano cited the accessibility of digital gambling and its effects on young people and families as the reasoning behind the proposal, which is co-sponsored by fellow legislators Carlos Najar and Roberto Moreno.

The bill would prohibit the organisation, operation, marketing and advertising of online games of chance and sports betting conducted through websites, mobile apps and other digital platforms in Tucumán. It would also withdraw existing licences, authorisations and permits currently held by online gambling operators in the province, and provide for technical measures to restrict access to betting sites and apps.

90-Day Transition for Existing Operators

Operators currently licensed to operate in Tucumán would be given a 90-day transition period to cease business under the proposal. During that window, they would have to stop accepting new registrations and deposits, and return any outstanding balances to users based in the province.

The bill is aimed specifically at digital betting rather than gambling in all its forms — traditional land-based gambling in Tucumán would not be affected. Fines collected under the proposed law would go exclusively to the province's mental-health programmes and gambling-disorder prevention initiatives.

Speaking with G3 Newswire, Toscano explained the thinking behind the bill. "Our objective is to prohibit online gambling. Gambling will continue to exist, as it always has. But today we have a form of gambling with a scale and accessibility that we have never had before," he said. "That is why we believe it is necessary to set a limit in our territory, because more and more people are exposed and more and more families are affected."

Argentina currently regulates gambling at the provincial level, with each of the country's 23 provinces and the city of Buenos Aires setting its own licensing regime for online betting and casino products. That patchwork has left individual provinces to weigh their own restrictions rather than face a single national standard, and Tucumán's Legislature has already been the site of several such proposals this year.

Follows Earlier Tucumán Gambling-Advertising Proposals

Toscano's bill follows separate proposals introduced earlier in 2026 by fellow Tucumán legislator Claudio Viña, who sought to prohibit gambling and online-casino advertising on football club shirts and in sports stadiums, bar clubs receiving state support from promoting virtual casinos or online betting, and introduce biometric controls for online gambling platforms.

moves elsewhere in Latin America to tighten betting rules have followed a similar pattern in recent months, as provincial and national lawmakers across the region weigh restrictions on a fast-growing online betting market. Toscano's bill has yet to be scheduled for debate in the Tucumán Legislature, and no timeline for a committee vote has been set.