Harry Reid would like to retain control of the Senate. The rest speaks for itself. It's an election year. He's not one to pull punches anyways.

I think Karak has it right that this is just politicians exchanging jabs. I am hoping that the result of this is some actual movement though. Not sure if Reid actually intends to try and get a bill through this month or if this is 100% about just giving Heller bad press. I don't think we can be fully certain either way so there is a chance that Reid will try to push a poker bill this month into the spending bill. Unlikely but could be possible.

That wasn't a jab from Reid. It was a shot from a bazooka. It's not good.

Oh also the new bill allows for but severely limits online lotteries. That's an interesting component. One could certainly say this really reels them back in after the OLC opinion maybe threw the door open.

"Kyl, however, said he and Heller “have talked to over half of our conference” and expect strong GOP support if the bill emerges from the Senate."

Five months, and they've only talked to "over half" of their conference?

“There’s not and never has been a definitive agreed-on plan between the proponents in the House and the Senate. But there has been kind of a gentlemen’s agreement, an understanding that it would originate in the Senate simply because Senator Reid’s the majority leader and he has a working relationship with Senator Kyl,” Barton, who has introduced his own bill that would legalize online poker, said in an interview on Tuesday.

Despite this, Barton said he has been urging the House Energy and Commerce Committee to mark up his bill so that the House could be prepared to act if the Senate moves legislation. House Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., told National Journal before the August break that he was waiting on the Senate to act first.

Can someone please tell me who's on first?

I did a quick read (reid) of the bill summary:

1. Undoes the Wire Act opinion last December,strengthens UIGEA with new amendments. Also strengthens the Wire Act to clearly ban online gambling.

2. All internet gambling, whether interstate or intrastate is prohibited. The only exceptions are horse racing and licensed poker. State and tribal lotteries can still sell lottery tickets online, but that’s the limit of what they could do. NO blackjack/roulette/craps etc.

3. Gives tools to law enforcement which includes a list of online poker companies. Only companies on this list get to participate.

4. Anyone who gambles on unlicensed sites aresubject funds forfeiture.

5. Bans internet poker cafes that proved access to online gambling.

6. Opt-in for states that want to participate. This happens via a voluntary election procedure for tribes and states. Any tribe/state that does nothing is automatically opted out. Opting in happens by a simple majority vote of each state legislature.

7. A new Office of Online Poker Oversight (OOPO) will be established within the Department of Commerce. This entity will oversee licensing.

8. The OOPO will designate state entities that will assist in regulation.

9. For the first 2 years, licensees (poker companies) must already be licensed land-based companies of a certain size and type.


(more to come)

Dont forget that the 15 month black out and non compete for stars / ftp for 5 years are both STILL in there. For some god knows why reason. I can see the stars / ftp i guess but why the hell do we need a 15 mo blackout now???

Looks like Harry is revisiting the Dream Act playbook from 2010.

JMHO, and Ive always been pessimistic about the chances of legislation, but I think we're close to drawing dead this Congress.

Reid's comments today are not good.

The bolded portions are HUGE toward making this a bill that could be logrolled for enough votes, especially if tacked onto another bill in a lame duck session.

#6 is a huge change from prior iterations, no oState is forced in by inaction .... the old proposals had all required a State to opt-out affirmatively.

This is all about whether Reid or Heller gets the blame in Nevada for the bill not passing before election day. Kyl wants Nevada voters to believe Reid is jeopardizing the bills' passage just to make Heller look bad. According to Kyl, if Reid just let the House go first the bill would pass. Whether that is true or not is another story.

The good news is nobody is talking about the bill not passing because of its content. If there is broad enough support for what the bill actually does, I don't think disagreements over how to get it across the finish line will stop it from passing altogether.

Thanks for the details slugger. Any word on a black out period or anything?

Also, I'm assuming the "list" in number 3 is basically the licensing of companies (as opposed to, here are the 5 companies who can partake and that's it)?

(the rest)

10. Any person involved in offering online poker after the enactment of UIGEA is prohibited for 5 years after this bill is enacted. (Lederer, Bitar, etc.) If they can prove in court they violated no federal or state law the prohibition will be lifted off of them. After the 5 years that person is under OOPO review.


11. No company can begin operations until 15 months after the bill’s enactment.

12. The bill estimates a 6 month period to establish the OOPO once the bill is enacted. After that 6 months another 3 months to create regulations and other qualified bodies. If this OOPO fails to get these things in place in 9 months.

13. The bill contains a mechanism that creates further barriers into exploring “other forms of internet gambling”

14. Each poker company pays a 16% monthly fee. Of that 16%, 14% goes to the state, and the remaining 2% goes to the federal government. That 2% cut of the fee goes to running the OOPO and other agencies involved in regulating online poker.

15. Poker players will pay income taxes. (haha BIG SURPIRSE!)

16. For state online lotteries, only “tangible” tickets can be sold online. Only lottery games that have infrequent winners (not daily) can do this. So it looks like actual online scratch off lottery tickets will be off the table.

17. Tribal regulatory bodies have the same shot (according to Reid) that state regulators will to apply for participation. Tribes can opt in the same as states and receive a share of the fees just like the states will. Tribes CANNOT regulate themselves however. If a tribe is in a state that does not allow online poker, it can still opt in on its own terms.

18. Any gaming that is authorized by states or tribes as of May 1, 2012 is preserved under the law.

For the lawheads out there, they have to defeat a rebuttable presumption and show by a preponderance of the evidence that they committed no wrong-doing.

Trust me, likely voters in Nevada don't give a rat's a$$ if this bill passes or doesn't before election day.

OTOH, I do see that Harry might want to demonstrate to the gaming industry that Reid (as Majority Leader + Berkley) has greater influence than Reid (as minority leader + Heller). If that line pushes MGM to pull out all stops to rally the troops on Nov 6, it will have served its purpose.

The shift to opt-in was a key change on content, especially if it will also give tribes a right to opt-in without concurrent approval from their State jurisdiction.

So Kyl, Hellar, and the GOP first want to first put a straight up ban on everything internet gambling and after that is done they say they will consider an online poker bill? Am I reading this right? That sounds like a super obvious bluff by the GOP iyam.

There is a 15 month "blackout" in this bill. This is to give the government time to set everything up.

MAN, this is just so sad. Can't we get this reduced a little? I understand time to get everything set up. But 15 months?

I would think 6-9 months should be good enough, but it is going to be a government agency. Typical.

If this is the best we can do, I guess I will bend over and take it....

.....but at the same time, I am extremely frustrated with this.

(assuming Virginia will even opt in, which is going to be a fight in itself)

They have to set up and staff an entire new federal agency which THEN has to start approving qualified bodies which THEN have to start approving sites. There's no way that doesn't take time. 15 months is fast tracking all that.

I've been out of the loop for a while, but is the consensus that we should support this? This is seems to be substantially worse than the status quo because of the Wire Act interpretation, but maybe I'm missing something.

I have the same question. The Wire Act opinion was pretty huge. I'm not feeling very good about the Reid bill and think it might be time for me to give up and move on to something else.

How I feel about our responses this week.

The release of the text of the bill is a very important development. Now all the politicians are going to have to tell the public where they stand on this. All this talk about the House sending a bill over to the senate, to be amended to exempt poker, and then sent back, show us that bill!! The conversation now is going to turn to the CONTENT of Reid/Kyl bill.

There would be one huge national player pool whose action all the licensed sites would be competing for. This is immensely important for a vibrant online poker economy. A bunch of states each off doing their own thing would not accomplish this, at least not for a long time. States forming big compacts would take a lot longer than 15 months.

Oh yeah, with this bill a lot of the people who would prefer to play blackjack online, now have to settle for playing poker. $$$.

The text of the bill is still being held very tightly under wraps. This is just a summary.

Opt-in over opt-out is awful, blackout period is awful.


So we get two huge legal victories and the potential legislation gets WORSE for us? Is this some kind of ****ing joke?