Online Poker Players Could Swing Election in Favor of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama

Regardless of political affiliation, when the 2008 US Election finally does take place, odds are that the millions of online poker players fearing further action against their favorite activity will likely vote in favor of the Democratic candidate, whether that is Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama.

Both Democratic contenders have expressed support of a study to determine whether regulating online gambling would be feasible in the US.  Barack Obama, himself, is an accomplished poker player.

Neither of the two Republican frontrunners, John McCain or Mitt Romney, have offered a position related to this platform.

To underestimate the online poker playing community could prove detrimental in this political race.  McCain's colleague in Arizona, Republican Jon Kyl, saw his support sag in the waning days leading up to his 2006 election.  He won another term, but by a much smaller margin than anticipated following reports that appeared in the Arizona Republic involving Kyl's efforts to ban online gambling.  The co-author of Kyl's online gambling prohibition in Iowa, Jim Leach, was not so lucky.  He entered the race as a heavy favorite to be re-elected, but lost in a shock upset that the Des Moines Register attributed to a campaign lodged by the online poker community in that state.  Thousands of online poker players were emailed messages pertaining to Leach and his desire to have their favorite activity banned.

When one considers that the Poker Players Alliance is made up of nearly one million members, it goes without saying just how powerful a group these individuals really are and the potential they have for swinging a relatively close election. 

Hillary Clinton knows this. 

Joe MacDonald of Covers.com writes:

Hillary's team went into the Nevada Caucus guns-a-blazin'. They dug up some old quotes from Obama where he expressed some pretty strongly negative opinions about gambling in general.

Of particular concern are these quotes:

From 2003... "moral and social cost of gambling, particularly in low-income communities, could be devastating."
From 2001... "you'll have a whole bunch of people who can't afford gambling their money away, yet they're going to do it."
Both of these quotes underscore an uneducated view of the gambling industry from Barack Obama. Yes, some people have gambling problems. Yes, some of those people are in low-income brackets. But to draw a correlation between low-incomes and gambling is simply incorrect. It makes a baseless assumption that people with low-incomes are somehow more prone to problem gambling than others. This simply isn't true.

Again, we note that Obama's camp is on record as saying they would support a study involving the regulation of online poker and gambling in general.

For most online poker fans, however, it's not so much about legalization and regulation as it is fear they may some day be imprisoned for playing in poker rooms over the Web.  Recent government trends point in that direction and the perception is that electing another Republican into office will not change things (unless of course we are talking about Congressman Ron Paul who is on record as being pro-online gambling and remains in the race).   Whether Clinton or Obama really want to pursue regulation of online gambling really will not matter just as long as the perception is there that they will not criminalize the activity.

Operating an online poker room in the United States is illegal (hence the reason they are all based offshore).  A recently passed law (the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act) passes the buck onto banks, so to speak.  They are simply held responsible for monitoring online gambling transactions.  The financial institutions have since said this is impossible being that some forms of online gambling (i.e. horse racing) were exempt from the law and they would have no way of differentiating between which are legal and illegal forms of online gambling.

To date, only Washington State makes it a Class C felony for individuals to gamble online. 

In fairness, while the Republicans are often deemed the "anti-online gambling zealots" this is not necessarily the case.  North Dakota Representative Jim Kasper - a Republican - has long been a staunch supporters of legalized online poker in his state.  It was a Republican Congressman in Washington State who voiced outrage over the Democrat Governor who pushed through the law criminalizing Internet poker.  And Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul is not only supportive of online gambling, he is co-sponsoring a bill with Democrat Barney Frank to repeal the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. 

It's unclear what position, if any, either John McCain or Mitt Romney have towards legalization of online gambling. 

McCain in the past has attempted to ban betting on college sports in Las Vegas.  His motivation was based on the temptation of unpaid college students to place wagers on - and potentially fix - games, as opposed to the moral decay of our society resulting from gambling on sports.  Romney has not commented on the issue. 

And then there is Democratic candidate John Edwards, who has pretty much been written out of the race, who is on record as saying he would not support any form of legalized online gambling.  So there you have it.

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Christopher Costigan, Gambling911.com Publisher CCostigan@CostiganMedia.com

Originally published January 29, 2008 3:57 pm EST