Justice Department issues new opinion that could further restrict online gambling
Source: Washington Post
By Tom Hamburger, Matt Zapotosky and Josh Dawsey January 14 at 10:47 PM
The Justice Department late Monday issued a legal opinion that could further restrict online gambling even as some states have been moving to embrace it — a restriction long sought by GOP megadonor Sheldon Adelson, who controls one of the world’s largest casino empires.
The opinion from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, which will probably be tested in the courts, reversed an Obama-era opinion that declared that the Wire Act applied only to sports gambling.
A medley of state and federal laws, including the 2006 Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, already make most online gambling illegal. But Justice Department prosecutors will soon be able to use the Wire Act, in addition to those other laws, to bring cases against online gambling operations.
“The change here will have some impact, but it doesn’t mean that large swaths of gambling that were once legal are now illegal and vice versa,” said a Justice Department official familiar with the matter, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
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Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/justice-department-issues-new-opinion-that-could-further-restrict-online-gambling/2019/01/14/a501e2da-1857-11e9-8813-cb9dec761e73_story.html
Source: Bloomberg
U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets
By Edvard Pettersson
January 14, 2019, 9:16 PM EST
The U.S. Justice Department now says federal law bars all internet gambling, reversing its position from 2011 that only sports betting is prohibited under a law passed 50 years earlier.
The reversal was prompted by the department’s criminal division, which prosecutes illegal gambling. The opinion issued about seven years ago that the 1961 Wire Act only banned sports gambling was a misinterpretation of the statute, according to a 23-page opinion by the department’s Office of Legal Counsel dated Nov. 2 and made public Monday.
The new reading of the law probably will be tested in the courts as judges may entertain challenges to the government’s view of the law’s scope, the Justice Department said. It may also affect states that began selling lottery tickets online after the 2011 opinion, as well as casinos that offer online gambling.
A coalition backed by billionaire casino executive Sheldon Adelson lobbied the Justice Department in 2017 to reconsider its 2011 decision that cleared the way for states to allow online gambling.
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Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-15/u-s-now-says-all-online-gambling-illegal-not-just-sports-bets