Mystery Winner Takes Home Historic Powerball Prize In Arkansas
If you drove to Mississippi to buy lottery tickets for the second highest Powerball jackpot in history, I can tell you now, you didn't win. A single winner in the State of Arkansas had the right numbers for the $1.817 billion prize.
Powerball officials announced the Arkansas ticket matched all of the winning numbers from Wednesday night's drawing: 4, 25, 31, 52, 59 and a Powerball of 19. The winner, who bought the ticket at a gas station in Cabot, Arkansas may not be known until Monday because the lottery claims center is closed until then.
“Congratulations to the newest Powerball jackpot winner! This is truly an extraordinary, life-changing prize,” Matt Strawn, Powerball Product Group Chair and Iowa Lottery CEO, was quoted as saying in a press release. “We also want to thank all the players who joined in this jackpot streak – every ticket purchased helps support public programs and services across the country.”
According to the release, this is the second time a ticket from the "Land of Opportunity" state has won a large Powerball jackpot, the first being in 2010.
The largest Powerball jackpot ever won was $2.04 billion in 2022 in California.
The Arkansas jackpot winner is not the only lottery ticket buyer who will celebrate a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. There were tickets in at least a dozen other states that matched multi-million-dollar wins.
Although illegal gambling is Alabama's largest business, don't expect to not have to drive to Mississippi to purchase a lottery ticket anytime soon. An Alabama legislative study a couple of years ago found every county in the state has illegal gambling operations. But because the proceeds are untaxed, literally hundreds of millions of gambling dollars are not going to help fund Alabama's poorly funded education system.
Leaders of the Alabama Legislature say they do not expect any bills for a lottery, sports betting, and casinos to get serious consideration in next year’s session, which begins Jan. 13.
The Powerball jackpot resets to $20 million with Saturday night's drawing. It may not be a payout in the billions, but it should be enough to live on. So, have a nice drive to the Magnolia State.
By the way, the odds of winning any jackpot are 1 in 292.2 million.
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