The industry is expected to spend millions more this year as those issues heat up again in Washington.

The $25 million the gaming industry spent on
lobbying in 2006 was a slight increase over the previous year’s total,
but down from the $28.5 million spent four years ago. Overall,
companies, associations and other groups spent $2.5 billion on lobbying
in Washington last year, with the pharmaceutical industry topping the
charts at $166.5 million.

The spending came amid controversy over public
corruption scandals involving convicted former lobbyist Jack Abramoff,
who admitted to bilking wealthy American Indian gaming tribes.

“Even though we didn’t have anything to do with
it, we all tend to get labeled,” said Frank Fahrenkopf Jr., president
of the American Gaming Association, which spent $900,000 last year
lobbying on behalf of commercial casinos.

Still, the gambling industry fared pretty well
in Washington, he said. And he expects casinos will do even better this
year because of a new cast of leaders in Congress who understand the
industry.

They include Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid,
a Nevada Democrat who has been a strong casino advocate; Rep. Charles
Rangel, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee; and
Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., the House Judiciary Committee chairman.

The industry also has Republican allies in
powerful posts, including Sen. John Ensign, a Nevada Republican, who
now heads the National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Much of the gambling industry’s 2006 lobbying
centered on legislation to ban online betting. The measure became law
after former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., inserted it
into an unrelated bill passed late last year.

Internet gaming supporters want lawmakers to reverse the ban before some of the regulations go into effect this summer.

The Poker Players Alliance, which lobbied
heavily against the ban recently hired former New York senator and
poker enthusiast Alfonse D’Amato to lead the group’s effort this year.
D’Amato’s message to former colleagues: the U.S. government could
generate $3 billion in taxes a year if it regulated the industry.

“There are millions of Americans who love poker
and who feel strongly their rights were taken away in the last
session,” said Michael Bolcerek, president of the Poker Players
Alliance, which paid another lobbying firm $540,000 last year to work
against the bill. “It’s an overreach of the federal government that
needs to be rectified.”

The alliance already has some support in
Congress for repealing the ban. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., chairman of
the House Financial Services Committee, told The Financial Times last week that the Internet gambling ban was one of the “stupidest” bills ever passed.

Meanwhile, two Nevada lawmakers, Reps. Shelley
Berkley, a Democrat, and Jon Porter, a Republican, are drafting a
proposal to study ways to regulate online gambling.

Gaming experts question whether the issue will gain any traction.

“It’s a subject the public cares somewhat
about,” said Robin Hanson, an economics professor at George Mason
University who studies the gambling industry. “But they’re not
overwhelmingly passionate about it.”

Hanson says it’s usually more difficult for
Congress to repeal anti-gambling measures than to pass them because
it’s the kind of issue most politicians don’t want to promote.

“Usually, the way gambling grows is by neglect,” he said.

Although efforts to ban off-reservation gaming
died in Congress, the Interior Department is considering regulations
that could restrict development of new Indian casinos on
off-reservation sites.

Dozens of tribes who want to build casinos — in
some cases hundreds of miles from their reservations — are lobbying
against the rules. But many wealthy gaming tribes support new
regulations, saying the practice has led to “reservation shopping.”

Tribal governments are also monitoring the
actions of the National Indian Gaming Commission, which wants to make
bingo machines used in certain Indian casinos work slower so they won’t
resemble Las Vegas-style slot machines.

Despite the high-stakes measures affecting
Indian casinos that Congress considered last year, the $16 million
tribes spent on lobbying was about 25% less than they spent in 2003,
according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Experts attribute the
drop-off to the Abramoff scandal.

“Since the Abramoff scandal, they have taken
more care in selecting lobbyists to represent them,” said Roger Gros,
editor of the magazine Global Gaming Business. “They’re much more selective on where they spend their money.”

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Author Contact Info: Diana Marrero, Gannett News Service