The Pros Speak (Again): Howard Lederer

Posted by The Captain | Filed under The Pros Speak

In our last post, Chris Ferguson sat down and shared his thoughts on the UIGEA and the state of online poker. This week, we were able to talk to Howard Lederer and get his perspective as well. Speaking as a PPA board member, he discussed what he sees as a favorable future for online poker. Here’s what Howard had to say, in his own words:

The PPA was thrilled with how the Congressional hearing went. In particular, it was really good that it showed how ambiguous the law is and what a difficult time the regulators are having with this particular law. It highlighted the fact that the regulators, because they are having such a hard time, basically wanted to abdicate their responsibility and not clarify or create what one regulator called a “bright line” as to what is and what is not illegal Internet gambling. That’s the real issue here. The government – officials from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury – recognized it as a very difficult question to answer. Of course when the bankers sat down, they said “if the government’s not willing to answer that question, how can they ask the banks to?” Again, it clearly highlighted some serious problems with the regulations.

This means the regulators have a lot of work to do. If they want to create this “bright line,” it’s going to take them a long time. It was suggested at the hearing that it be made clear that sports betting is identified as illegal online wagering, and then develop a formal process for determining the legality of other activities. Of course this would be activity by activity and state by state. That would take a while, which is fine. I think that poker would do fine in that process and that poker would be declared legal, which would be a good thing. I would love to see that process happen.

It’s important that we keep drawing attention to the difference between poker and sports betting; between poker and casino gaming. Poker is a game of skill and people love to play it.

Another really good thing was how bi-partisan the negative comments were about this law and the pending regulations. We saw Democrats and Republicans basically in unanimity making it clear that they weren’t happy with the law or the regulations. This was something new that we’ve not really seen. So far, this has been seen as a Republican law from the last congress which Democrats have been fighting against. In large part, this was because it was seen as a bit of political hackery.

There is a wing of the Republican Party – the true conservative wing – that realizes that this is a bad law. I think that those members of the party have wanted to come out against this and support the Frank and Wexler legislation, but felt that maybe they’d be going against their party and even costing themselves votes with the Christian conservatives. And I think that the more we see people like Pete King (R-NY) and Pete Sessions (R–TX) out there, in public, making it clear that this is not a good law, the more that wing of the party is going to feel that they can go out on the limb with them and maybe it’s not going to break. Maybe there won’t be negative consequences, in fact maybe there will be positive consequences, where these people will be voting for and promoting policies that they believe in. I thought that was really big. There is a real coalition here that is being built of the large majority of the Democratic Party and the true conservative Republicans. We’re starting to see this – it is starting to happen. It was one of the first times that we’ve seen this in a public setting.

The next steps will be that the coalition builds, momentum is gained, there are more hearings, and that the argument on our side of things – for online poker – will get stronger and stronger. Evidence in favor of online poker is growing as well. There are more and more studies about poker as a game of skill. And these studies show that online gambling isn’t a horrible thing that’s going to destroy civilization as we know it. And for the “doom and gloom” people on the other side, there is no evidence to support their views. It’s entertainment and people enjoy it – particularly when you talk about player to player games like poker.

It will take time to build up this coalition. It’s an election year and I think that we realize that it’s going to be tough to get anything passed. But I do think that next year is a very real possibility and I do hope that the regulations, or at very least the regulations that would severely and unfairly impact poker, wouldn’t be issued before we could get a legislative resolution.

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