Anti-RAWA Petition Highlights Serious Player Apathy

Home » Poker News » Anti-RAWA Petition Highlights Serious Player Apathy

Tuesday, April 21st, 2015 | Written by Stephen Smith

In an effort to counter the Restoration of America’s Wire Act (RAWA) introduced by Rep. Jason Chaffetz to Congress in February, the Poker Players Alliance subsequently launched an online petition on the 2nd of April, 2015, entitled “We the People”. Its intention was to collect a minimum of 100,000 signatures within a thirty day period in order to justify a specific White House response, but unfortunately just 3,995 people have thus far added their name to the petition, highlighting a surprising level of apathy within the USA’s online poker playing community. With time running out, it seems likely the PPA’s petition will now fall dramatically short of its intended goal.

“We the People” Petition Explained

The “We the People” petition is the brain-child of PPA Vice President of Player Relations Rich Muny, and currently appears on the petitions section of the White House website. The powerful messages promoted by the Anti-RAWA voter petition is that US citizens should have their “Internet freedoms protected”, and should rally to “oppose efforts in Congress” to shut down the online poker and gambling industry. As an extract from the petition’s short text explains:

“Regardless of personal opinions on wagering, the Tenth Amendment directs that states decide such matters, not Congress. RAWA benefits only certain large donors, while state-licensed sites safeguard players, prevent underage participation, and protect those with excessive gaming habits. And, the safety and security of licensed sites drives unlicensed sites out of the market. Please pledge to veto RAWA. Thanks.”

Needless to say, the petition is not intended solely for PPA members or poker players to sign, but should also be of interest to any US citizens wanting to see their general internet freedoms protected. All that is required is the person’s name, city/state, and e-mail address.

RAWA Would Reverse UIGEA

The UIGEA was reinterpreted in 2011 to allow individual US states to determine their own legislation for online poker and gambling, and in 2013 Nevada, Delaware, and New Jersey all launched state online gambling industries. RAWA not only seeks to prevent other states from following suit in the future, but would also have these three US regulated markets dismantled, as well. Thus far the USA’s regulated states have already invested millions of dollars developing their nascent iGaming industries, and are finally beginning to streamline their operations and form viable interstate networks. Therefore, pulling the carpet from under their feet right now would set a hugely negative example for other companies currently considering investing in the country’s usually stable business environment.

Why All The Apathy?

With so much at stake, one wonders what is behind the reluctance of US poker players to get involved in the political arena, in this case via a simple online petition. One reason may be that RAWA is seen as having only a very slight chance of passing, and therefore players may not see lending their support as a particularly pressing concern.

Furthermore, many of the games greatest representatives, such as Doyle Brunson, Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, and Phil Ivey are first and foremost live players, and so are not very motivated to promote internet poker. Just Negreanu, for instance, has an online sponsorship deal in place with PokerStars, and when Black-Friday struck in 2011, the 10-times WSOP bracelet winner Doyle Brunson antagonized the online community at the time by tweeting the following message:

“Now maybe we will see if these online ‘superstars’ can play real poker. Ante up suckers!”

Another major factor helping to explain the political apathy is that generally poker players are a very independent group of people who would rather distance themselves from the concerns of “normal society” and especially the glacial world of politics. Aware of this inherent problem, in February the PPA recruited online poker veteran Andrew Lichtenberger, 27, to help promote the cause of legalized online gambling in the US. However, once again the poker community gave the news little attention, demonstrating the uphill struggle the PPA has ahead of it when trying to organize political action from such a disparate group as the poker playing community.

Still Time Left To Sign

Having said all that, there is still time left to collect enough signatures to show that the poker playing community is a political force to be reckoned, and are prepared to fight to see online poker a permanent feature of the USA landscape. Therefore, I encourage all players to lend their support to the Anti-RAWA petition because even if 100,000 signatures are not collected, at least Congress will see there exists strong opposition to the Restoration of America’s Wire Act (HR 707).