US Online Poker under Control of Land Casino Industry
Online poker is now legal in a few US states, and the first licensed online poker room Ultimate Poker was launched in Nevada in early May this year. But online poker players in the US are far from happy with the limited nature of legalized online poker in their country. Legal access to large offshore online poker rooms is still a dream; besides, online poker players in Nevada, where Ultimate Poker is located, cannot play with poker players in other US states.
US online poker players also complain that the hold of major casino companies over the US federal and state governments is so great that politicians and law makers are least bothered about the interests of individual poker players. Everything the US government has done so far favors the land casino giants the most, making sure that they can keep the lucrative US online poker market for themselves.
US online poker players have only one desire—they want to play real money poker at any online poker room of their choice. It is a simple wish, but US online gambling laws are so complicated that it is almost impossible for US poker players to get what they want.
As gambling expert I. Nelson Rose puts it, “There’s so much legal gambling in this country that legalizing one form is no big deal politically, but there’s so much legal gambling in this country that almost every state has very powerful, entrenched special interests. Legal gambling already exists and says: ‘We’re in favor of Internet poker as long as we’re the ones that get the money.’”
Giant casino companies in the US can hardly be blamed for demanding their rightful share of the US online poker market, which is estimated to be worth around $2 billion every year. Meanwhile, the international online poker industry continues to function even after losing one-third of its customers in 2011. While it is legal for online poker players in Russia, Mexico, and Ireland to play online poker, online poker gaming is denied to US players unless they are based in Nevada.
US online poker is now owned by the established giant casino companies, who do not want things to be changed even at the cost of US online poker consumers. Now that the Obama government has refused to approve an online poker bill at the federal level, US poker players are at the mercy of state governments that are completely under the control of casino companies and do not care about them.
It is, therefore, not surprising that New Jersey’s online gambling laws as well as the online gambling bill proposed in Pennsylvania prohibits companies based outside their respective jurisdictions. This forces poker companies to first form partnerships with casino companies based within the states in order to launch online poker sites.
Right now, it is not possible to say if US poker players will ever be able to play poker with players of other states or if they will ever be able to play at major international online poker sites.
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