Another Delay for Frank's Internet Gambling Bill

April 15, 2010 | News Category: Gaming Law

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After much excitement was generated, the hearing in the House Financial Services Committee for the Barney Frank online gambling bills has been delayed. This means that the gambling bills will not be heard this week, on Friday April 16th. At this time, no new date has been given for the hearing.

Barney Frank is the chairman for the House Financial Services Committee. The reason for the delay is somewhat unclear, but it appears to be a scheduling conflict. A spokesperson for the House Financial Services Committee said "We had a previously scheduled event in Massachusetts." At the time of the announcement, no new date had been set for the hearing. The spokesperson, however, did add that a new time and date for the hearing would be announced as soon as it is scheduled.

One wonders why Barney Frank, both the author of the bills, and the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, will not be in Washington DC on the date for which the hearing was scheduled. Surely those who organize the chairman’s diary would have been aware that his online gambling bills were the ones that were coming up for a hearing?

Although the implementation of the UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act) has been postponed in order to allow time for the online gambling bills to be dealt with, it was only delayed for six months. The June 1st deadline is coming closer and closer, and many are concerned over this new delay to begin the legal process for the online gambling bills.

The first bill, the "Reasonable Prudence in Regulation Act" has been written in order to have the UIGEA delayed for a further one-year period. This bill is necessary because the Treasury Department has said that they will not extend the current suspension that ends on June 1st.

The second bill, the "Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection and Enforcement Act" is the second bill that is awaiting the hearing. This bill lays out details of how companies would be licensed, regulated, and legalized.

The Frank online gambling bills have been waiting for a year since Frank introduced them. On the one hand, after all this time, a short delay does not seem so bad, but on the other hand, the UIGEA implementation date is most definitely looming very soon. If the beginning of the process takes too long to get going, and the UIGEA is in fact implemented, there could be new issues to contend with at the same time as the online gambling bills.