Congress Is Going to Examine Fantasy Sports & Gambling

Congress is going to look into this whole fantasy sports for money thing that you may have seen advertised on your televisions. Democratic congressman Frank Pallone Jr. has requested that a Congressional committee take a look at the connection between fantasy sports and gambling. I wonder where he got that idea? Via the Committee on Energy & Commerce:

"“Anyone who watched a game this weekend was inundated by commercials for fantasy sports websites, and it’s only the first week of the NFL season,” said Ranking Member Pallone. “These sites are enormously popular, arguably central to the fans’ experience, and professional leagues are seeing the enormous profits as a result. Despite how mainstream these sites have become, though, the legal landscape governing these activities remains murky and should be reviewed.”"

Also:

"“Fans are currently allowed to risk money on the performance of an individual player. How is that different than wagering money on the outcome of a game?” noted Pallone. Involvement of players or league personnel who may be able to affect the outcome of a game also raises additional questions about the relationship between the entities, especially when professional leagues often actively promote fantasy sites, like DraftKings or FanDuel."

Daily fantasy sports and such are currently exempt from Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) because of the “carve-out” which the New Yorker explained in a piece about fantasy sports earlier this year:

"Daily fantasy is one of those ingenious ideas that seem obvious and inevitable in retrospect, but it might never have existed were it not for a convergence of lobbying during the second term of the George W. Bush Administration on the part of the National Football League and the Christian right, both of which opposed the spread of offshore sports betting enabled by the Internet. Their efforts led to the passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, a hastily appended rider to a port-security bill. UIGEA, commonly pronounced “you-EE-juh,” sought to block financial institutions from processing payments associated with offshore gaming and was later used to stamp out the booming business of online poker in this country. But the law also included an explicit “carve-out,” as fantasy entrepreneurs say, for fantasy-sports “games of skill,” thanks to the N.F.L., which had recognized that a casual fan’s vested interest in yardage counts and sack totals might well keep him from changing the channel in the garbage minutes of a 34–7 blowout. Better for ratings, better for ad revenues."

So fantasy sports could become illegal and we’d have our beer and car commercials back, or the government could start to loosen its view on gambling. Or some third option that I haven’t thought of.