Home / Poker News March 2013 / The Poker Grapevine – AGA Comes Out Swinging Against PokerStars
The Poker Grapevine – AGA Comes Out Swinging Against PokerStars
Posted by: Jo Martin - Wed, 2013-03-06 03:16
Proponents of
legal online poker in New Jersey have long hailed PokerStars’ intention to purchase a live casino operation in Atlantic City as a potentially important development for the state’s beleaguered casino industry, and a move which could prepare the ground for PokerStars’ return to the US online poker market. As a matter of fact, many have pointed to PokerStars' potential move as one of the main benefits of signing the proposed poker bill into law.
Gov. Chris Christie has indeed made the historic move a couple of weeks ago, and it apparently took about that long for some of the gambling interests to wake up and to start opposing PokerStars' plans to purchase the above said brick-and-mortar establishment.
The American Gaming Association (AGA) has filed a brief with the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement and the Casino Control Commission, making a case against allowing the world's biggest online poker room to purchase brick-and-mortar property in Atlantic City.
According to the brief, AGA lawyers argue that
PokerStars used deceit and misinformation in the past to push its business in the US, operating as a criminal enterprise within the country for several years. While there is indeed some truth in the allegations, one can't help but wonder what the real reasons behind the steps undertaken by the AGA are.
The AGA brief is basically looking to block the Rational Group’s efforts to obtain an Interim Casino Authorization, just as the above said two authorities are preparing to launch a licensing process unprecedented in the history of the Garden State.
PokerStars’ Eric Hollreiser was quick to bill the step a public fight picked by “self-interested partisans”. While Hollreiser’s sum-up of the matter probably does have some accuracy to it indeed, it is noteworthy to point out that PokerStars had in fact operated illegally in the US for quite a number of years.
