The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit is upholding a lower court ruling that the New Hampshire Lottery Commission can continue to sell lottery tickets online, despite a challenge by the Trump Administration.
The case centers on an opinion released by the Department of Justice in 2018 that found online lottery ticket sales violated the Wire Act, which was signed into law in 1961. The Office of Legal Counsel’s decision was a reversal of its own 2011 memo that cleared the way for online lottery sales.
New Hampshire, which launched online lottery sales based on the 2011 guidelines, filed a legal challenge to the federal government in federal court. NeoPollard Interactive, which the N.H. Lottery Commission contracts to provide online lottery gaming, also joined the suit.
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Howard Stutz, CDC Gaming Reports ·
January 20, 2021 at
4:10 pm
A Federal Circuit Court Wednesday rejected the Justice Department’s 2019 decision to revise the Federal Wire Act, agreeing with a lower court in New Hampshire that the 1961 law relates only to interstate sports betting.
The ruling by the First Circuit Court of Appeals favored the case brought by the New Hampshire Lottery, which sought to vacate the 23-page opinion from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel.
The opinion, dated Nov. 2, 2018, reversed a 2011 ruling on the Wire Act that said the law only pertained to sports betting. The revised decision said the Wire Act covers any action where gaming information is transmitted over the Internet.
The First Circuit ruled Wednesday that the federal Wire Act applies only to interstate communications related to sports betting, rejecting a 2018 U.S. Department of Justice legal opinion interpreting the act as applying to gambling more broadly.
New Hampshire won its second consecutive court victory against the U.S. government, reported
Jeff Ifrah, a lawyer in the case. The First Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Wire Act applies only to sporting events and contests, meaning online lottery â and, of interest to the poker industry, interstate online poker â does not violate U.S. law.
The state had brought suit against the government after a late 2018 memo changed the Department of Justice s stance on the matter.
Short of a final appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, there s little to stop the continued growth of online poker in the U.S. now.