Home / Poker News August 2010 / Frank’s bill and the road to legal online poker
Frank’s bill and the road to legal online poker
Posted by: James Carter. - Thu, 2010-08-05 09:24
The fact that Barney Frank’s famous online gambling bill got a positive vote in the House Financial Services Committee, got a lot of players and online poker operators excited. Many people act like federally legalized
online poker is just around the corner in the US, effectively opening the market up for all those operators who have been awaiting the moment of their triumphant return to the US since 2006.
While the vote was indeed a positive development, the situation is not quite as bright as many people would like to believe. This vote in itself means a good start for the process of legalization, but that’s about it. The road ahead is long and it’s fraught with many pitfalls, some of which may yet stop the process altogether.
Now that the first step has been taken, it needs to be followed up by several moves of similar amplitude. The first such move would be to get Jim McDermott’s companion bill aimed at establishing guidelines and procedures for the taxing of online poker and online gambling, through the House Ways and Means Committee. With almost half a year left to accomplish this feat, surely it would be done in 2010, right? Not exactly. You see, the House of Representatives recess starts on August 9th, and it lasts all the way to September 12th. This week’s pretty much in the books already, so everything will be put on hold till at least the middle of next month. Even then, the window of opportunity will be an extremely small one because of the November elections. Because the elections are likely to hand Republicans majority (and let’s not forget Republicans are still not keen to have poker legalized), the whole effort may run ashore right there and then.
