A bill that would have legalized iPoker in the Golden State is dead for this legislative year—for the tenth year in a row.
Assemblyman Reggie Jones-Sawyer, author of the most recent bill, admitted defeat last week. The reason is a lack of consensus among the major California gaming tribes, who disagree on the form the bill should take.
The main sticking point is whether PokerStars, which operates the largest online poker site in the world, should be allowed to play in the California market with its partners, several gaming tribes and two card clubs.
The 40 million Californians are considered to be the most lucrative potential Internet poker market in the U.S.
Steve Stallings, chairman of the California Nations Indian Gaming Association, which represents most Indian casino tribes in the Golden State, told Card Player that his perception is that PokerStars has pulled in its lobbying horns in Sacramento. This may be because its parent company Amaya has begun to diversify to online games other than poker, such that a majority of its revenue now comes from those games.
Stallings speculates that a consensus on iPoker might follow if PokerStars ever gives up its efforts to offer iPoker through its casino partners.
Jones-Sawyer said he will continue to try repair the breach between gaming interests and lawmakers that became a Grand Canyon towards the end of this year’s session.
He told Online Poker Report: “Obviously, we’re not going to put anything across the desk now. If you look at the Assembly, we have other big things such as the transportation bill to focus on. This would not be a good year to put something controversial in. I think the ability to work out something next year has a bigger chance if we do some of the come-together healing things right now.”
He added, “I don’t want to sound like a minister or psychologist, but we’ve got to start from ground zero where we’ve got to at least get people to want to try to get it done again. When I first started on this in earnest, we were going slow and methodical, and we had some successes. We weren’t trying to rush anyone and we weren’t pitting one side against the other, as best we could.”
This year looked promising from the perspective of Adam Gray, chairman of the key Governmental Organization Committee.
Last year Gray thought he had reached an accommodation between the horse racing industry and tribes whereby racing gave up any place at the table in exchange for a $60 million annual payment.
But he faltered when he attempted to hammer out a compromise between the supporters of PokerStars and its avowed foes. He wasn’t able to push them to a consensus. At one point the debate became so heated that Gray had to call in the sergeant at arms.
Then Gray and his staff became the focus of press investigations over the fact that he appeared to change course on the issue of PokerStars, apparently at the instigation of his father-in-law, who was a lobbyist. Because of this hostility, Gray declined to introduce legislation. Jones-Sawyer did, but found himself swimming against a current.
Now, says Jones-Sawyer, “we have to go back to the same methodical strategy as before, but we may have to go even slower because you don’t want to have people pushed up against the wall. That’s when people start to get a little nervous and strained.”
He likes to compare the legalization of online gaming to the legalization of marijuana. “I’m really excited about the future of online gaming and gambling in general,” he said. “Just like adult-use marijuana is going to open a huge industry, online poker is the tip of the iceberg. I’d rather go slow to get it right because, once it expands to other types of games, if we don’t have it right it will be even worse.”
Meantime, California is losing its opportunity to get into the game well ahead of other states. Soon Pennsylvania will become the fourth state to legalize online gaming.
