Sports activities betting firm DraftKings has apologized after utilizing the Sept. 11, 2001, terror assaults to entice individuals to wager on baseball and soccer video games
ByWAYNE PARRY Related Press
September 11, 2023, 3:07 PM
FILE – The DraftKings brand is displayed on the sports activities betting firm headquarters, Could 2, 2019, in Boston. DraftKings apologized Monday, Sept. 11, 2023, after utilizing the Sept. 11, 2001, terror assaults to entice individuals to wager on baseball and soccer video games on the anniversary of the tragedy that killed almost 3,000 individuals. (AP Photograph/Charles Krupa, File)
The Related Press
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Sports activities betting firm DraftKings apologized Monday after utilizing the Sept. 11, 2001, terror assaults to entice individuals to wager on baseball and video games on the anniversary of the tragedy that killed almost 3,000 individuals.
The Boston-based firm provided customers a 9/11-themed promotion that required three New York-based groups — the Yankees, Mets and Jets — to win their video games Monday, the twenty second anniversary of the assaults on the World Commerce Middle and Pentagon and the downing of a passenger jet in a area in Pennsylvania.
After an outcry on social media from individuals offended by the promotion titled “By no means Neglect,” DraftKings took it down and apologized.
“We sincerely apologize for the featured parlay that was shared briefly in commemoration of 9/11,” the corporate wrote. “We respect the importance of at the present time for our nation and particularly for the households of those that had been straight affected.”
Bret Eagleson, whose father, Bruce, was killed within the World Commerce Middle, runs a households and first responders group known as 9/11 Justice. He decried the DraftKings provide as “tone-deaf.”
“It’s shameful to make use of the nationwide tragedy of 9/11 to advertise a enterprise,” he advised The Related Press. “We want accountability, justice and closure, not self-interest and shameless promotion.”
The corporate wouldn’t say how many individuals positioned bets on account of the provide, nor whether or not these bets stay legitimate or whether or not they have been canceled.
DraftKings is among the main corporations providing authorized sports activities betting within the U.S., which has grown quickly because the U.S. Supreme Court docket cleared the best way for it in 2018. Two-thirds of the nation now provides it.
Bets of the sort DraftKings provided, through which a number of video games or outcomes are bundled right into a single wager, are extraordinarily worthwhile for sports activities books, and providing gamblers preselected groupings, known as parlays, is a vital a part of sports activities wagering.
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