Second California bill introduced
California legislators will have rival poker bills to consider when they return in the New Year.
California Senator Rod Wright has reintroduced his internet gambling bill, giving the California legislature multiple poker legalisation measures to consider when it returns in January.
SB 45 is identical to Wright’s SB 1485 that stalled in committee in June following opposition from several tribes and card clubs, ostensibly on the basis it would have allowed offshore poker sites and Las Vegas casinos to run web gambling in California.
The bill is believed to be a placeholder in the legislative agenda ahead of the reintroduction of the bill by a new sponsor in an amended form, including reverting back to a poker-only measure. Wright’s amendment of the bill to include other casino games proved to be a stumbling block to several California tribes lending support to SB 1485.
The California legislature will now have multiple online poker legalisation measures to consider when it returns in January.
As reported by eGR on Wednesday, Senator Louis Correa introduced legislation on behalf of the California Online Poker Association (COPA), led by the Morongo Band of Mission Indians and the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians.
Correa’s SB 40 bill however does not contain language that would offer an exclusive licence to the Morongo-led consortium or any other competing grouping, despite persistent fears from other gaming stakeholders in the State that the tribe would push for a monopoly for COPA, formed back in August of this year.
COPA’s bill is clearly another attempt by potentially stakeholders in California to get State legislation on the books ahead of the federal poker bill currently being pushed by Harry Reid, which if enacted in its current form would outlaw all other forms of online gambling other than horse racing bets across State lines.
COPA spokesman Ryan Hightower said in a statement. “COPA opposes the current lame-duck effort by Harry Reid because it hurts California. Reid’s effort rewards the Nevada gaming interests that gave him hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign donations during the recent election. California has a US$25bn deficit and an unemployment rate of 12%. Any revenues generated by Internet poker in California should stay within the state and not be shipped off to Washington, DC, or Nevada or even offshore.”
Reaction from tribes across the US to Reid’s bill has been broadly negative, given that certain language in the bill is seen to favour the Nevada casinos over Indian tribes in qualifying to apply for a licence.