The legality of online poker in the United States is a complex and ever-changing landscape. Currently, there are four states where online poker is legal: Nevada, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.
There are also three states where online poker is explicitly illegal: Washington, Louisiana, and Kentucky. The remaining 43 states have no explicit lAWS on the subject.
This leaves a lot of room for interpretation, which has led to a patchwork of regulations across the country. Some states have taken a hands-off approach and chosen not to regulate online poker at all.
Others have taken a more proactive stance and put in place specific regulations governing the activity. And still others have outright banned online poker altogether.
The current legal landscape is the result of years of legal wrangling and political maneuvering. It all started back in 2006 when the federal government passed a law known as the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA).
This law made it illegal for banks and other financial institutions to process transactions related to online gambling.
The UIGEA had a profound impact on the online poker industry in the United States. Suddenly, major poker sites like PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker were forced to pull out of the US market overnight.
This left a vacuum that was quickly filled by smaller, unregulated sites.
The UIGEA was followed by a series of court challenges, culminating in the famous 2011 case of United States v. Scheinberg et al.
This case struck down the UIGEA as unconstitutional and paved the way for individual states to start regulating online poker within their own borders.
Since then, a slow but steady trickle of states has begun to do just that. Nevada was first out of the gate, followed by Delaware and New Jersey.
Pennsylvania became the fourth state to legalize online poker in late 2017. And Michigan appears poised to become the fifth state with legal online poker in the near future.
So what does all this mean for you? If you live in one of the four states with legal online poker, you can play freely on any site that is licensed by your state gaming commission. If you live in one of the remaining 43 states, you can still play on unregulated sites, but do so at your own risk.
Ultimately, whether or not you can play online poker legally depends on where you live.
