Lawmakers urge Sessions to ban online gambling

Sen. Mark Warner issued a letter earlier this month in which he urges Attorney General Jeff Sessions to review his stance on online gambling.

US.- The Department of Justice (DOJ) issued a memo in 2011 in which it favoured online gambling legalisation. Attorney General Jeff Sessions opposed the controversial document back then as a Republican member of the Senate and is now being urged to do the same thing.

Sen. Mark Warner is pressing Sessions to review the DOJ opinion in order to bar online gamblig sites since they are -according to him- “especially fertile platforms for the facilitation of money laundering, collusion and other illegal activities.” According to news outlet The Hill, Warner cited the FBI findings in a letter he issued to the Attorney General on July 5 and argued the “potentially predatory nature of online gambling represents a heightened threat to economically vulnerable populations.”

“The OLC opinion appears to be based on legal interpretation alone and does not provide background on the extent to which consideration was given to social, economic and law enforcement implications,” says Warner.

Sen. Warner joins a major list of politicians opposing online gambling legalisation including members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, ranking Democrat Dianne Feinstein and Sen. Lindsey Graham, who wrote to Sessions saying they hope “that Justice will restore the department’s longstanding practice of enforcing the Wire Act against online gambling by revoking the opinion.”

According to his stance in 2011, Sessions also questions the DOJ’s opinion that the 1961 Wire Act only applies to sports betting. Back then, he said he was “shocked” by the “unusual” memo and pledged to take a look at it as Attorney General.