The California online poker legalization bill was unexpectedly withdrawn without any explanation.

This week the California online poker legalization bill was removed from the agenda of the Senate Governmental Organization Committee without even being debated. This move surprised many industry watchers.Senator Rod Wright, a chairman of the committee, was a sponsor of the Senate Bill 1463. He felt that the bill won’t have enough votes to pass through and therefore he decided to withdraw it and this way to escape the bill to be defeated. After withdraw, the bill can be reintroduced and discussed later on.

As Wright said, two different groups conflicted with each other in the bill. Indian tribes operating land casinos and card clubs offering poker stand against legalizing online poker as they fear to lose their business. Wright spent more than two years to accommodate the diversity but it was a vain efforts. Wright is going to continue working on reaching the compromise on legalization of online poker in California. But this year the bill stands little chances to succeed. The co-sponsor of the bill, Senator Darrel Steinberg, was even more dejected and according to his words, he won’t lose any sleep over it, if there is no deal.

June 21, 2012