Lobbyist group Poker Players Alliance is in the middle of a high stakes politics game, culminating this week in their efforts to get online poker exempted from the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act passed by Congress in 2006.
As part of its “National Poker Week,” the group has set up nearly 100 meetings with members of Congress and their aides, and plans to present a petition to President Barack Obama on Wednesday that had more than 374,000 signatures at last count. Famous professional poker players such as Chris Ferguson, Howard Lederer, Daniel Negreanu and Greg Raymer are on the nonprofit group’s board of directors. The group is chaired by former Sen. Alfonse D’Amato, R-N.Y.
In a nutshell, here’s the hand that the PPA is holding:
* Technology has progressed to effectively combat problem gambling and ensure that players are of legal age.
* Billions in potential tax revenue from online poker are being lost under the UIGEA.
* Appropriate federal regulation can ensure that minors are kept out of sites, services are provided to problem gamblers and the proper taxes are collected. The current system does nothing to protect children, problem gamblers and it is allowing billions in tax revenue to go overseas.
* Prohibitions don’t work. The UIGEA effectively bans online poker in the U.S. and drives those players underground. Meanwhile, poker continues to grow in popularity nationwide. 75 percent of Americans oppose banning online poker. According to national polling, a vast majority of Americans oppose federal efforts to ban online poker.
* If Congress allows me to bet on horses and state lotteries online, why can’t I play a skill game like poker with other consenting adults?
But Roberta Combs, president of the Christian Coalition of America, which opposes online gambling, was not moved by any of that.
“We still don’t support it,” she said in a telephone interview with news service AP. “When you start gambling on the Internet, it’s just too accessible. You can do it from home, and it’s so much easier. We just feel like that’s an issue that has a tendency to break up the family.”
Combs didn’t seem concerned that the poker group’s efforts would have much of an impact.
“I don’t think it’s going to come up” in Congress, she said. “If we think it will, then we definitely will work it hard.”
The poker group supports legislation by Rep. Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat who chairs the House Financial Services Committee, that would regulate rather than ban Internet gambling.
In its petition to Obama, titled “Poker is Not a Crime,” the group pushes for poker to be licensed and regulated in the US. The PPA estimates there are at least 10 million Americasn who play online poker, illegally spending an untaxed $6 billion a year.
Last month’s seizure of $34 million in the accounts of online US poker players by the feds has been a major talking point for the stakeholders. The Poker Players Alliance is trying to get that money returned.
Here’s a couple videos pleading the case for legalized online poker.