Poker News – 1.3.11

New Jersey Legalisation Countdown Begins

On the 5th March 2011, the U.S. state of New Jersey will finally find out it its residents will be able to gamble online once again. The bill was passed by the State Assembly with a vote of 65 – 11 and previously at the State Senate with a 29 – 5 majority.

New Jersey Governor James 'Chris' Christie now has four options before him – do nothing (in which case the bill automatically becomes law), pass it into law, veto it conditionally (it would be sent back to the Assembly for changes) or veto it completely.

On the face of it the choice for Christie seems easy – the Senate and Assembly have both cleared it with substantial majorities and New Jersey is a state in need of tax revenue. Online gambling is projected to raise $500 million in tax revenue and create around 57,000 jobs. So citizens of New Jersey should be able to look forward to a little online action shortly.

What the bill does not do is enable residents to partake in global online gaming of the type common to much of the rest of the world. It will essentially be a walled garden, you will have to live in New Jersey and will only be able to gamble against other residents using New Jersey bookies. This is largely to avoid the bill coming into contact with the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), the federal bill which put a stop to online gambling in the U.S. in 2006.

Interestingly, if other states follow New Jersey's example, it has been suggested they could link up and bet against each other, forming bigger and bigger networks of online gamblers. This would effectively nullify the UIGEA and would quite possibly make the federal government think twice about the rationality behind it (at a time of recession) and the feasibility of it's enforcement. It should also be noted that the big online foreign operators are not keen to be involved state-wide type of business.



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