In a letter dated October 19th, 2015, Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster and South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson urged fellow Attorneys General to sign-on to a letter asking Congressional Judiciary Committee Leadership to support Sheldon Adelson’s Restoration of America’s Wire Act (RAWA). The letter is addressed to Rep. Bob Goodlatte and Rep. John Conyers, the Chairman and Ranking Member, respectively, of the House Judiciary Committee, as well as Sen. Chuck Grassley and Sen. Patrick Leahy, who hold the same respective positions in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
This is not the first time this has been done. At the beginning of 2014, Koster and Wilson, along with Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning petitioned their colleagues for the same cause, getting a dozen other Attorneys General onboard. Their tactic was a little bit different at that time, as RAWA had yet to be introduced. In last year’s letter, they simply encouraged Congress to ban online gambling outright, framing it in such a way that it looked like they just wanted to be able to pause things for a while so that online gambling could be studied further.
But now with RAWA circulating on Capitol Hill, the anti-poker crowd has perhaps a slightly easier vehicle to serve their agenda. Congress doesn’t have to figure out how to ban online poker out of thin air – the bill is already there.
In the letter to the Judiciary Committees, Koster and Wilson employ the usual rhetoric to try to make their point:
DOJ’s revised interpretation of the Wire Act opened the door to expansive Internet gambling and has had significant negative impacts on our states from money laundering to exploitation of children to helping finance terrorist organizations. Additionally, the expansion of online gambling has undermined state and local law enforcement efforts to outlaw gambling which is prohibited in many states. As such, we urge Congress to adopt the Restoration of America’s Wire Act.
The letter continues, presenting dubious evidence to try to make the case that online gambling is a scourge on the nation. For instance, the Attorneys General actual try to say that regulated online gambling has not worked in New Jersey:
As predicted, regulation of online gambling has proven difficult for states. This June, New Jersey announced it would not prosecute illegal gambling sites that have been operating in the state since 2013, provided the companies cease business within the next five months. Given the inherently interstate nature of Internet gambling transactions, we anticipate that it will become increasingly difficult to effectively regulate such conduct as additional jurisdictions consider legalizing Internet gambling.
It goes on, presenting some gambling statistics and citing the 2011 Black Friday indictments, ending with how because the internet can cross state boundaries, this sort of thing should be governed (read: banned) by the federal government:
To be sure, we believe Congress may only regulate transactions which are interstate in nature, consistent with fundamental constitutional principles. Our system of government commands that intra state matters, including the regulation of gambling at brick-and-mortar facilities and intrastate lotteries is clearly vested in the states. However, Internet gambling is inherently inter state in nature and states are ill-equipped to enforce gambling laws against interstate and international companies, particularly when age and location verification mechanisms are subject to compromise and the technological vulnerabilities of the Internet. Accordingly, it is critical that Congress act now to reinstitute the federal ban on online gaming.
The letter has yet to be sent to members of Congress, as Attorneys General have until October 30th to sign.