Nevada Passes First Interstate Online Gambling Law

State official in Nevada made a bold mark in the history books last week by being the first state to pass an interstate online gambling law. Thanks to the rapid fabrication of an emergency measure, AB114, Nevada has declared that is no longer needs the approval of a federal statute to permit its residents to participate in online gambling outside of its own borders.

The Assembly Bill was written and passed within a matter of weeks. It was introduced on February 13, 2013, and then passed by both the Assembly and Senate on February 21. That same day, it landed on the desk of Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval where he immediately studied and signed the new law into effect.

Gov. Sandoval made it very clear that he wanted to pass an interstate online gambling law the moment New Jersey’s cleared a path for legalization of internet gambling in that state. For supporters of the new bill, the alacrity of Nevada’s administration is commendable, to say the least.

Just two short weeks ago, NJ Gov. Chris Christie again vetoed a bill to legalize internet gambling, but at the same time, he announced that he is strongly in favor of legalization. He gave his staff a list of minutiae to incorporate into a new bill, which they are vigorously working to accommodate. New Jersey is expected to pass its own online gambling legislation as early as the beginning of March.

Now that Nevada has legalized online poker on an interstate level, Sandoval is hoping that New Jersey will follow suit and allow the two markets to tap into one another. Delaware was the first state to pass intrastate online gambling laws, and with Nevada and New Jersey projected to be working together in the very near future, it is more likely that Delaware will also convert to interstate legalization.

The Federal Wire Act strictly proscribed interstate gambling up until December of 2011, when the US government overturned its previous ruling and declared that the Wire Act applied only to sports betting. States were then given the right to ink their own laws in regards to online poker and casino gambling.

At that time, Nevada wrote its online gambling laws to permit intrastate online gambling, with a provision to allow interstate online gambling once the government approved interstate regulation on a federal level. However, the federal government stalled, leaving Nevada with little choice but to assemble its own laws in regards to interstate online gambling.

It’s not exactly certain whether Nevada’s new legislation will be permitted to stand by the US government. There is every possibility that government will reject the passage of Nevada’s AB114, but the Silver State is confident in their right to forge ahead with the new interstate law.

All that is left is for Nevada to establish contracts with other states to permit their residents to gamble online across each other’s borders. Gov. Sandoval assured everyone that the state will cooperate with the US Department of Justice via open communications as Nevada works to ink agreements with other states.