Virginia Valentine
Virginia Valentine has led the Nevada Resort Association, one of the state’s most influential interest groups, for nearly 15 years. Last year, however, was unique in Valentine’s tenure due to a litany of developments that impacted the Silver State’s gaming industry.
From the defeat of another lottery proposal to a high-stakes lawsuit involving prediction markets, 2025 was a busy year for the association and its members. Valentine spoke with iGaming Business U.S. News Editor Jess Marquez in Las Vegas at October’s Global Gaming Expo.
GGB: Las Vegas’ tourism slump has been a major storyline in 2025, although optimism is returning now that the events/entertainment schedule is ramping up. What’s your outlook?
Valentine: Yes, it seems like there’s always something new coming, so there’s cause for optimism as Las Vegas keeps reinventing itself and coming up with new things.
I wouldn’t have envisioned a few years ago that we’d be talking about the Super Bowl or F1 or an A’s stadium. So all those things continue to add to the whole diverse portfolio of what we can offer.
The association was active this year lobbying for rule changes for Nevada salons, or private gaming rooms. What inspired that advocacy?
A gaming salon is a space that can be operated in private or public mode, giving you the opportunity, with enhanced security and surveillance by the regulators, to offer that private gaming experience. So we believe that it becomes more of an amenity if you can offer that. I think it gives the operator a lot of opportunity and flexibility to create those experiences for customers who bring a lot of value in different ways to the resort.
The inclusion of poker was a big part of the salon overhaul efforts. Why was that important?
There are a lot of card games that go on in other states, and you can’t have that kind of a private card game here. It’s kind of leveling the playing field. It was something other legal venues were able to offer that we weren’t able to. So now we have the ability to do that.
Certainly there are a lot of public poker rooms around, but this would be, again, a more private, more curated experience, something we could really make special.
It’s impossible not to mention prediction markets, as the association is an intervenor in the state’s lawsuit against Kalshi. What is the status of that, and what is your view of prediction markets?
I can’t say too much because we’re involved in litigation. But for anyone who looks at the site, it looks like gambling, but gambling with no regulation. You could be 18 to 21 instead of over 21. There are no requirements for responsible gambling. They don’t pay any state income tax. So it looks a lot like gambling.
We’ll see. Is it the future of gambling or the end of sportsbooks? I don’t know. I imagine this will be in the courts for a while, so we’re just keeping a close eye on it.
Finally, the association has fought hard against any lottery efforts for decades. A lottery bill made it farther than ever in 2024 but was ultimately defeated in 2025. Why is opposition to the lottery in Nevada so fierce?
I think it puts the state into the gambling business with the private sector. That’s one reason. And also when we look at it, it doesn’t create a lot of jobs. There is no brick-and-mortar investment. With some of the beneficiaries over time—I think in this case it was mental health—there was no clear plan how that money would even make it into a mental health program. That’s one of the big things, when you’ve got big brick-and-mortar investments (worth) billions of dollars, as my members do.
