Terror delays work on gaming issues

Kevin Ferguson

Thursday, Sept. 27, 2001 | 11:05 a.m.

If there's going to be congressional action against Internet gambling or college sports betting, it won't be coming this year, says former Nevada Sen. Richard Bryan.

Earlier this month many congressional opponents of Internet gambling hoped to adopt a ban on cyber-gambling. But the former Democratic senator said the terrorist acts of two weeks ago have pushed the gambling related issues "way down on the agenda."

"In light of the Sept. 11 events, the (congressional) focus has shifted. No one is talking about Social Security or Medicare," he said, referring to the hot button issues in Congress before the terrorists strikes on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Bryan spoke at a reception Wednesday for the Interactive Gaming Conference & Expo, an Internet gambling conference running through Friday in Las Vegas.

Earlier Wednesday Bryan returned from Washington, where the partner in the Lionel Sawyer & Collins Las Vegas law firm was conducting business and meeting with former congressional colleagues.

In July federal lawmakers told a House panel that Congress must move to adopt a ban on Internet wagering within the United States to pre-empt a Nevada law passed in June that empowers the Nevada Gaming Commission to establish and regulate Internet gambling.

Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., have authored separate bills aiming to ban U.S. wagers from being placed or accepted on the Internet. Rep. Jim Leach, R-Iowa, has authored a bill that would ban the use of credit cards for placing bets in cyberspace.

These bills aim to close loopholes that may exist in the 1961 Federal Wire Act, which some say already outlaws Internet gambling by forbidding the practice of placing bets over phone lines.