- Can I play online poker in Washington State? Yes, there's no question about it. But what about the draconian Washington online poker laws? They've NEVER been used to go after an individual player. Read on for all the details about the online sites you can play at, the bonuses that await you, the live poker scene in WA, and more.
- Sep 01, 2014 One example is when the state of Washington passed a law banning online poker, PokerStars pulled out of the state. Greenstein simply omits the four years that passed between the law passing and PokerStars pulling out of the state. Four years in which, by my view, they operated in clear violation of the law.
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- How To Play Online Poker Wa State Online
- How To Play Online Poker
The State of Washington is the only state in the United States that has a specific law prohibiting online gambling. In many states, existing gambling law may pertain to online gambling, but this is not always clear, whereby in Washington they have taken the step to make it very clear that it is illegal.
The Gambling Act of 1973 did prohibit the sending and receiving of various gambling information across the technologies of the day, but this did not of course include the internet. So in 2006, the state legislature passed Bill SSB 6613 which added the technologies of the internet and other means of telecommunications as being prohibited for use for gambling purposes in Washington. They also upgraded the offense from a gross misdemeanor to a felony (1)
The law was challenged in Washington State Supreme Court by the Poker Players Alliance in 2010 on the grounds that it was unconstitutional, but the court upheld the law. So it is here to stay unless there is a political will to change it, and so far this hasn‘t been the case.
This is a discussion on Pokerstars to stop serving Washington State Residents within the online poker forums, in the Poker Rooms section; This is really horrid news: PokerStars has announced that.
So if you are playing poker online and reside in the State of Washington, you are both receiving and transmitting gambling information over the internet, and therefore you are clearly in violation of the law and have committed a criminal act.
So this means that online poker players in Washington now face possible jail time for playing online, and while no one has gone to jail yet for this, it probably won’t happen either because no online poker room will touch players from this state anymore.
It has been quite some time in fact since any poker room offered play to Washingtonians, and even Poker Stars and Full Tilt stopped taking players from there long before they stopped taking Americans in general. This is all unlikely to change unless it becomes regulated at some point down the road.
As of right now, the ONLY poker site only that currently accepts players from Washington is Ignition Poker and BetOnline, which is ok with us because they’re not only one of the most trusted rooms out there today, but they also provide solid cashout timeframes and soft cash game tables.
Efforts To Improve The Legal Situation Of Online Poker
Some in Washington State have argued that since poker is primarily a game of skill, it should be treated differently from other forms of gambling such as sports betting and casino games. However, this has pretty much fallen upon deaf ears, and poker continues to be treated just like any other gambling contest.
Even efforts to reduce the penalty involved for playing online poker have met with difficulty. A bill was introduced to try to decriminalize online poker playing, reducing it from a felony to a class 3 civil infraction, and setting a maximum penalty of a $50 fine, but it remains to be seen if we will ever see even this (2).
There is a view that many politicians are looking to protect the state’s land based gaming operations, which are quite extensive indeed, and they certainly stand out as far as the levels they will go to in order to prevent online gambling, including poker.
Washington though is known as a fairly permissive state where gambling is concerned though, and some have speculated that there may be a will to regulate online poker at some point down the road, although there is nothing on the horizon as of yet.
The Washington State Gambling Commission might be in favor of it though when you look closely at their position on online gambling, with all of the pitfalls they list being remedied through regulation (3).
So for those who live in Washington and want to play online poker, the best – and really ONLY – option is Ignition Poker. You can check out their review above the review on this page or sign up directly from this page as well.
Washington State Live Poker
There are over 50 locations that offer live poker in Washington State, and the list is in fact too numerous to mention here, although an up to date list can be found in the following reference (4).
in addition to permitting the many Indian casinos to offer poker, Washington does license card rooms in a similar fashion as California, and they used to only permit player banked games like California does, meaning that the house can’t take a percentage of the betting, but this has since changed and now they permit raked games as well (5).
These card rooms also not only offer poker for money but other card games as well such as blackjack.
The poker rooms tend to be on the smaller side although they range as high as 32 poker tables. There is quite a bit of tournament action available in addition to the cash games offered.
So in spite of the toughest laws in the country against online poker, poker players in Washington can still fairly easily find a game, due to the very large amount of places throughout the state that offer real money live poker.
Sooner or later, as the regulated online poker market in the U.S. matures, and more and more states get in on the action, the lure of the additional tax revenues involved may end up luring Washington State politicians to be more open to this idea.
References:
(1) Washington State House Of Representatives Commerce and Labor Committee, Bill Analysis, SSB 6613.
(2) Washington State Rep Wants To Decriminalize Online Poker
(3) The Washington State Gambling Commission’s Compelling Case For State Regulated Online Gambling
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(4) All Live And Online Poker Rooms In Washington
(5) Casinos: Washington
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Even though the state of Washington has passed legislation that made playing online poker a crime punishable by jail (the only U.S. state to do so), in 2015 lawmakers there are going to look at getting rid of the draconian rules and actually legalizing the activity.
It would be a historic reversal of such an extreme position.
Late last week, House Bill 1114 was introduced into the legislature by Rep. Sherry Appleton, a Democrat. Right now, people in Washington state can play poker in card rooms and tribal casinos that have been OK’ed by the state for running the games.
According to PokerAtlas, there are 74 brick-and-mortar poker rooms in Washington. Though, the state is harsh on card games in other contexts, as evident by state regulators last year shutting down a 25-year-old penny-ante pinochle game at a senior center in the city of Snohomish.
Washington has an interesting approach to gambling, but HB 1114 might help correct that. HB 1114 would only authorize poker for online real-money play.
A proposed tax structure has yet to be fleshed out.
How To Play Online Poker
“The legislature finds that the internet is an integral tool in the everyday lives of Washingtonians,” the bill reads. “Commerce, communication, and entertainment are just some of the areas in which this technological aid thrives. Poker has long been an authorized activity in Washington state, and with the internet as a technological aid, poker can be conducted in a virtual environment and played from the privacy of one’s own computer or mobile device.”
According to the measure, despite the criminality of online poker play in Washington state (no one has ever been convicted of a crime for playing online poker there, fortunately), playing cards on the web via offshore sites has remained popular among residents.
“Despite a lack of regulation due to prohibition, playing poker over the internet remains popular with Washington state players,” the bill added. “To better protect the people of Washington from potential danger from, and to maintain oversight of the systems used to carry out internet poker, the legislature finds it to be in the interest of the people to establish a regulatory framework by which entities, as authorized by the Washington state gambling commission or a tribal regulator, may offer poker games to players within Washington state over the internet.”
Currently, three states in the country—Nevada, New Jersey and Delaware—have state-sanctioned online poker industries, and all three have experienced lower-than-anticipated revenues from the activity. States are going to need to partner up to create the liquidity needed for online poker. The proposed bill in Washington addresses this topic.
“Where feasible, the governor may enter into multistate agreements allowing for shared player liquidity across common platforms,” the bill says.
California is also looking to legalize online poker in 2015, though there’s a lack of a compromise between competing gambling interests. It’s no sure bet it will happen this year.
Other states in the mix for being next to legalize online poker are Illinois, New York and Pennsylvania, though none of them are as likely as California, according to industry experts.
