PPA CHAIRMAN WARNS ON W.T.O. COMPENSATION

2 November 2007

"In a matter of months, you're going to see billions of dollars in trade sanctions coming down against the United States"


The New York Post gave prominence this week to the visit by delegates from the Poker Players' Alliance to Washington to educate US politicians on the benefits of regulating online poker, publishing an interview with chairman Senator Alphonse D'Amato.

The article commented that despite daunting odds of reversing the effects of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, one wild card could force Washington's hand: an international trade dispute with Antigua over online gambling that could end up leaving the U.S. on the hook for billions of dollars.

The article recapped events leading to this position, pointing out that the World Trade Organisation recently ruled that the U.S. violated its international treaty commitments by going after offshore online gambling outfits without cracking down on American operators offering remote betting on state lotteries, horse and dog racing.

After the ruling, Washington said it would remove Internet gambling from its WTO treaty obligations. That raised the ire of such allies as Europe, Japan and other WTO member nations which filed separate compensation claims against the U.S.

"In a matter of months, you're going to see billions of dollars in trade sanctions coming down against the United States," former New York Sen. Alfonse D'Amato, told The Post. "Then, I believe we will start to have a profoundly new and different group lobbying, saying you've got to stop this prohibition [on Internet gambling]," he said. "We look like the ugly American."

The article emphasises that playing poker online for money isn't explicitly illegal in the U.S. And Congress stopped short of passing an outright ban on Internet gambling sites last October. Instead, lawmakers cracked down by banning credit card companies from making payments to online gambling sites through legislation attached to a late-night, eve-of-recess and unrelated bill on port security.

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