As Congress returns to work, Capitol Hill conservatives worry about open partnerships among retiring Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) AND Senator Lindsey O. Graham (R.-SC) ban online gambling.
Reid said he was consulting with Graham on legislation for a federal ban on online gambling, and both men agreed that the House of Representatives would first pass its bill at the same time. Reid’s March 27 interview I gave it to Joe Schoenmannhost of the KNPR program “State of Nevada“the program in which a long-time person appeared for the first time President Barack Obama.
After the president took Reid’s response off the air, Schoenmann asked him about the efforts Las Vegas Sands Chairman Sheldon Adelson ban online gaming through federal legislation called the Restoring America’s Wire Act. The RAWA bill would argue that the provisions of the 1961 Wire Act have made and always will make online gambling illegal.
During the telephone conversation, Schoenmann made a mistake.
The host asked Reid to talk about how, after promising to legalize online gambling nationwide, he responded to Adelson’s efforts to go the other way.
“Joe, you have your facts wrong,” Reid said. “I think online gambling is not good for our country.”
The senator said he had been working to legalize online poker nationwide for the good of Nevada and the nation, but in the face of failure, he now intends to move toward banning online gambling altogether.
Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware have legalized online gambling within their borders. If it becomes law, RAWA would re-criminalize online gambling in those three states.
Reid, who embarrassed Republicans earlier this session with his delaying tactics and invocations of parliamentary procedure, said he told Graham in a March 26 phone call not to worry about obstruction from Democrats.
“I won’t interfere with it at all,” he said. “If it passes the House, we’ll try the Senate.”
The senator told Schoenmann that, based on his four years of experience as chairman of the Nevada Gaming Commission, he favors greater control over gambling in general and in Indian areas in particular.
During the last session of Congress, Reid was content to operate in secret and allow Speaker John A. Boehner (R.-Ohio) take the lead on banning online gambling. Boehner is very close to Adelson, as demonstrated by the speaker’s invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address joint sessions of Congress.
That same week, during Netanyahu’s speech, Boehner met with Boehner as well as the two men who carried the ball for him: Graham and Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R.-Utah).
Just like the White House and House Minority Leader, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (Democrat of California)Reid gave Boehner the space he needed to personally push RAWA. No one in the Democratic leadership is sticking their neck out on Boehner’s word — not because he’s lying, but because he can’t keep his word.
However, with Reid’s support, RAWA came very close to being included in a December 11 continuing resolution aimed at averting a government shutdown.
With Boehner failing to load the bale onto the wagon, the next step was to rush the bill through the House to the waiting Senate. But that path was blocked by the House when the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee Congressman Robert Goodlatte (R.-Va.) insisted on maintaining the regular agenda and then refused to hold a committee hearing that would have been considered to be in accordance with the regular agenda.
Adelson has no intention of leaving.
In terms of practical politics, opposing RAWA means saying “no” to a man who has written checks totaling more than $100 million to the Conservatives. Campaign 2012 Adelson endorsed former Speaker for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination Newton L. “Newt” Gingrich and former Pennsylvania state senator Richard J. Santorum.
Just because both Gingrich and Santorum lost, Adelson’s support allowed them to stay in the race and keep their candidate, the former Massachusetts governor, alive W. Mitt Romney from moving away from Conservatism in the general election as early as he wished.
Before Adelson raised the gigantic question, the passage of RAWA, he was a defender of conservatives who are Republicans. But because conservatives have shied away from banning their patrons’ online professions, clubhouse Republicans may have no such qualms.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the fence, Harry Reid’s last gigantic move before he leaves the national stage may be to put Democrats ahead in the race to win the real primary in the country: Adelson’s Checkbook.
