Peter King Proposes Federal Online Poker Regulation

Republican Representative Peter King has filed a draft to regulate not only online poker but online gaming in general on a federal level in the US.

Despite being regarded as one of the most promising proposals to legalise the game since the UIGEA of 2006, the bill to regulate the online poker market in the United States of America on a federal level, filed by Senators Harry Reid and Jon Kyl, failed permanently in December last year. Republican Representative Peter King has just filed a draft resembling the Reid-Kyl Bill but aiming to eliminate its flaws. For example, the King Bill includes the state lottery companies in the regulation process, in order to weaken the counter lobby supported by them, the National Governors Association, Native American as well as religious groups.

Representative King eventually filed his proposal, titled “Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection and Enforcement Act of 2013”, late last week with the aims of regulating all forms of  online gambling on a federal level, including online poker. Handing out licenses and enforcing the regulations would be the privilege of the government of the USA.

States that have successfully regulated online poker – Nevada, Delaware and New Jersey – would be able to carry on according to their own rules until the federal regulation comes into effect, when they would be integrated to the new system.

The regulation would follow an opt-out structure, which means individual states would have the option to decline the ratification of the act. This, however, also means they would not be able to offer any kind of online gambling at all.
King’s draft has been co-authored by the Poker Players Alliance (PPA). This bill has the largest scope of its kind so far, due to the fact that it not only deals with online poker but the entire online gaming sector.

It is rumoured that Representative Joe Barton, lobbying for a federal regulation of online poker since 2011, is also preparing a similar draft.

You can read the bill in its entirety here.