If you like to gamble at your favorite local casino on slots and table games (and who doesn’t) I bet you wish you could place a bet on the World Series or the Super Bowl there as well. I know I do.
Unfortunately, that isn’t likely to happen any time soon. Under the 1992 Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA), sometimes called the Bradly Act, Federal law made sports wagering illegal in all states except Nevada, Delaware, Oregon, and Montana. These four states were all grandfathered in because of wording in their state legislation allowing sports gambling at the time. New Jersey could have been added to that list. The state was given an eighteen month window to legalize sports betting and become the fifth state covered under the law, but it let its opportunity pass without acting. Regretting their missed opportunity, NJ repeatedly filed suit over the years since attempting to be added to the favored four to no avail. Recently the Supreme Court, by refusing to hear the New Jersey case, effectively ruled that any changes must now be legislative not judicial. So, Atlantic City won’t be accepting bets on sports teams anytime soon.
It’s not just team sports like football and hockey, baseball and basketball that we Californians are unable to wager on at sport books. We can’t even play the ponies here in the Golden State except at the tracks.
California has tried several times to make sports betting legal. In the most recent attempt, Senator Roderick Wright introduced California Senate Bill 190 seeking to allow sports betting at the California venues that allow legal gambling: tribal casinos, card rooms, and horse racing tracks. The bill did not pass, dying in committee June 8, 2013. Even if it had passed, however, because of PASPA, action would have been required in Washington DC before it could be implemented.
Most of the Californians I know visit Las Vegas when they want to bet on athletic events. The Vegas sports books can legally accept wagers on professional sporting events and college competitions, but not on non-collegiate amateur sports. This restriction is based on Nevada gaming regulation 22.120-1(a). The prohibition stems primarily from a compromise worked out with Senator John McCain to restrict betting on amateur sports to collegiate ones.
Recently the Las Vegas sports books have questioned just what constitutes amateur sports. They question if the Olympics should even be considered amateur sports when teams are made up of professional athletes like LeBron James. Why should it be legal to bet on professional basketball and hockey players when playing for their home teams, but not be legal to bet on these same individuals when competing in the Olympics for their country? Are the Olympic athletes even amateurs when they are paid such large sums of money for product endorsement? Or when they earn comfortable livings playing these same games? Tough questions to answer.
Starting in the 1970’s, requirements that players be amateurs have gradually been phased out of the Olympic Charter. After the 1988 games, the IOC decided to make all professional athletes eligible to compete. As of 2012, the only sports in which no professionals compete are boxing and wrestling, and some of those fighters receive cash prizes from their national committees.
Vegas sport books have teamed up to lobby the Nevada Gaming Commission to allow betting on Olympic events in that state, hopefully in time for next year’s Summer Games in Rio. If the Commission gives its approval later this month, news sources report the IOC will monitor the change closely to safeguard the integrity of the competition. Proponents point out that Olympic betting is already common throughout the rest of the world, and that there have been no problems resulting from wagering on these sports.
We’ll keep you posted when we learn more.
UPDATED 3-13-2015
It’s unanimous! As of February 26th, Amateur sports regulations no longer ban betting on Olympic events at your favorite Nevada sportsbook. For more information and current betting odds, check out my updated blog entry HERE.
Showing posts with label California. Show all posts
Showing posts with label California. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Wednesday, February 11, 2015
Getting Ready for Online Poker
How would you feel if it suddenly became legal to play poker online? Would you still make the trip to your favorite casino or card club for the fun and fellowship, or would you place your bets on your home computer? If two Los Angeles assemblymen have their way, you may soon be faced with that choice.
Gambling has been an on again - off again activity in the USA almost as long as there has been a USA. It was completely banned in the 1890’s, and then, in the roaring 20’s it began making a comeback. It was finally fully legalized in Nevada in 1931. Over time riverboat gambling and then state lotteries and then Native American casinos became legal throughout the nation as states sought to tap into this profitable source of revenue. There are only two states currently that forbid all forms of gambling: Hawaii and Utah. The others all allow some forms of wagering and forbid others. You might be interested in a site called gambling-law-us.com where you can find out the laws of any particular state you want to know about.
The first online casino began operation in 1995, offering 18 online games. It quickly caught on. Conservative estimates have the profit from cyber-gaming growing from $1 billion in 1997 to $10.9 billion in 2006. In 2006, Congress banned online gambling by passing UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006) which prohibited wire transfers for betting. Together with the Wire Act which banned sports betting, these two laws were interpreted as prohibiting most online gambling. In 2011 the US Department of Justice reversed the Federal Ban on Internet Gambling, allowing states to decide whether to legalize the practice within their borders. Since then Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware have all approved rules allowing online state-regulated poker sites. Eight other states, according to Fox News, have bills in the works. California is one of them.
California Democrat assemblymen, Mike Gatto and Reginald Jones-Sawyer, have each introduced bills, AB 9 and AB 167, each called the Internet Poker Consumer Protection Act of 2015, hoping to expand online gaming to tribal gaming facilities and licensed card rooms, but not to racetracks. Both bills ban games banked by the house, including slots, video poker, and table games. Poker is viewed differently because it involves some measure of skill where players can earn winnings in the long term. If adopted, an action which would require a two thirds majority to pass, a deposit of $5 million dollars would be required to apply toward future taxes. Licensees would have to have had 3 years of gaming experience, reduced from 5 years in earlier drafts, a requirement which would exclude some newer casinos from participating. The bills also ban internet cafes. All operations and all gamblers would have to be located in California. Another problem to be resolved is the “bad actors” clause in Gatto’s bill, which could potentially ban the Morongo Band of Mission Indians from operating a site because of association with companies who had ignored the federal ban from 2006 through 2011.
If you are interested in learning more about the progress of California Internet gambling, you can read the full text of both bills and statements by the sponsors at www.californiaonlinepoker.com.
Gambling has been an on again - off again activity in the USA almost as long as there has been a USA. It was completely banned in the 1890’s, and then, in the roaring 20’s it began making a comeback. It was finally fully legalized in Nevada in 1931. Over time riverboat gambling and then state lotteries and then Native American casinos became legal throughout the nation as states sought to tap into this profitable source of revenue. There are only two states currently that forbid all forms of gambling: Hawaii and Utah. The others all allow some forms of wagering and forbid others. You might be interested in a site called gambling-law-us.com where you can find out the laws of any particular state you want to know about.
The first online casino began operation in 1995, offering 18 online games. It quickly caught on. Conservative estimates have the profit from cyber-gaming growing from $1 billion in 1997 to $10.9 billion in 2006. In 2006, Congress banned online gambling by passing UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006) which prohibited wire transfers for betting. Together with the Wire Act which banned sports betting, these two laws were interpreted as prohibiting most online gambling. In 2011 the US Department of Justice reversed the Federal Ban on Internet Gambling, allowing states to decide whether to legalize the practice within their borders. Since then Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware have all approved rules allowing online state-regulated poker sites. Eight other states, according to Fox News, have bills in the works. California is one of them.
California Democrat assemblymen, Mike Gatto and Reginald Jones-Sawyer, have each introduced bills, AB 9 and AB 167, each called the Internet Poker Consumer Protection Act of 2015, hoping to expand online gaming to tribal gaming facilities and licensed card rooms, but not to racetracks. Both bills ban games banked by the house, including slots, video poker, and table games. Poker is viewed differently because it involves some measure of skill where players can earn winnings in the long term. If adopted, an action which would require a two thirds majority to pass, a deposit of $5 million dollars would be required to apply toward future taxes. Licensees would have to have had 3 years of gaming experience, reduced from 5 years in earlier drafts, a requirement which would exclude some newer casinos from participating. The bills also ban internet cafes. All operations and all gamblers would have to be located in California. Another problem to be resolved is the “bad actors” clause in Gatto’s bill, which could potentially ban the Morongo Band of Mission Indians from operating a site because of association with companies who had ignored the federal ban from 2006 through 2011.
If you are interested in learning more about the progress of California Internet gambling, you can read the full text of both bills and statements by the sponsors at www.californiaonlinepoker.com.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)