Monthly Archives: June 2022

The Jan. 6th Committee on Why Oaths Matter – Lawfare

Posted: June 22, 2022 at 11:41 am

Rep. Bennie Thompson opened his committees hearings on the Jan. 6 insurrection by discussing not just the recent memory of the Capitol riot, but something that happened over 150 years earlier: the Civil War. He was born, he said, in a town midway between Jackson and Vicksburg, Mississippiboth sites of major Union victories that helped turn the tide of the war in 1863. Im from a part of the country where people justify the actions of slavery, Ku Klux Klan, and lynching, Thompson explained. Im reminded of that dark history as I hear voices today try and justify the actions of the insurrectionists of January 6, 2021. And he pointed to the oath of office sworn by himself and his fellow committee members, and highlighted its origin story: The words of the current oath taken by all of usthat nearly every United States Government employee takeshave their roots in the Civil War.

The role of the oath, and the historical lineage behind it, has come up again and again during the select committees hearings on its investigation into the Jan. 6 riot. During the first hearing, not just Chairman Thompson but also Vice Chair Liz Cheney and Capitol Police Officer Caroline Edwards referenced oaths throughout the hearingemphasizing the importance of the solemn promise they made to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And in his prepared statement released before the committees third hearing on June 16, retired Judge Michael Luttig wrote, Todays politicians believe that they never have to choose between partisan party politics and country, when in fact they are obliged by oath to choose between the two every day[.] Greg Jacob, counsel to Vice President Mike Pence, likewise referenced Pences commitment to his own oath.

On one level, focus on the oath might seem strange. Why spend this time discussing the matter of the oath sworn by government officials, when every minute spent on that topic is a minute not spent talking about the lawbreaking committed by insurrectionists or the culpability of President Trump and those around him in the violence? But the references made to the oath throughout the June hearings speak directly to how the committee seems to understand the nature of its work and its responsibility to the public. In broadcasting the truth of what happened on Jan. 6, the select committee is underlining the extent to which Trump breached his own presidential oath by encouraging the attack on Congressand what this breach represented as a betrayal of the countrys democratic traditions. And the committee, made up of members of Congress who also swore an oath, is taking the opportunity to play a unique role in reflecting on the nature of the promise that government officials make to the American people.

The president is the federal governments most prominent swearer of an oath, and the presidential oath is the only one whose language is set out explicitly in the constitutional text. But as Thompson reminded viewers, the presidents pledge to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution is not the only such oath required by that document. The Constitution also provides that members of Congressalong with state legislative officials and judicial and executive officials at both the federal and state levelsshall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution. The committee portrayed the constitutional oath as the sine qua non of government service, and it put forward its own argument for what fidelity to the oath and the Constitution mean. As Cheney said at the hearings closing:

In our country, we dont swear an oath to an individual, or a political party. We take our oath to defend the United States Constitution. And that oath must mean something. Tonight, I say this to my Republican colleagues who are defending the indefensible: There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain.

The committee chair and vice chair told the story of Jan. 6 as a day of oaths upheld and broken. Oath talk aboundedThompson, Cheney, and the witnesses uttered the word almost 20 times. For Thompson, the police officers who held the line that day honored their oath, including Edwards, who objected to rioters calling her a traitor to my country, my oath, and my Constitution. Cheney hinted at then-Vice President Mike Pences oath adherence when she spoke of his higher duty to the United States Constitution, which Pences chief of staff made explicit in prerecorded testimony played at the hearing: I think [Vice President Pence] ultimately knew that his fidelity to the Constitution was his first and foremost oath. Cheney also praised Trump-appointed lawyers Jeffrey Rosen and Richard Donoghue as oath faithfuls. These men honored their oaths of office, Cheney said. They did their duty, and you will hear from them in our hearings.

As Thompson said, the oath currently sworn by members of Congress and federal law enforcement like Edwards has its origins in the Civil War. But the preeminence of oaths in American government goes back to its founding. Even before the Constitution was drafted, the Continental Congress adopted in 1778 a requirement that federal officers swear an oath of loyalty to the United States. A few years later, the framers mandated oaths in Article I, Article II, Article IV, and the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution. And the first Congress of the United States passed as its very first law a statute regulating the administration of oaths.

From 1789 onward, officials swore simply to support the Constitution of the United States." During the Civil War, however, Congress developed this language into the far more involved Ironclad Test Oath, committing swearers not only to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, against all enemies, foreign and domestic but also to promise that they had never voluntarily borne arms against the United States or engaged in other acts of disloyalty. The oath was later revised further to make room for service by former Confederatesbut the change to the text in the midst of the fighting speaks to the importance of the oath in affirming a commitment to certain core principles undergirding the nation. Likewise, Congress reaffirmed the sanctity of oaths through the passage of the 14th Amendment, which, in Section 3, bars from holding office any individual who had previously sworn an oath to support the Constitution but then engaged in insurrection or rebellion.

Perhaps the most well-known commentary on the oath comes from Justice Joseph Story, who wrote in Commentaries on the Constitution that oaths have a solemn obligation upon the minds of all reflecting mena proposition that he considered too clear to render any reasoning necessary in support of it. The necessity of the oath, according to Story, comes from the plain right of society to require some guaranty [sic] from every officer, that he will be conscientious in the discharge of his duty. Writing over a century later, Chief Justice William Rehnquist similarly argued that the Constitutions oath requirement aims to assure that those in positions of public trust [are] willing to commit themselves to live by the constitutional processes of our system.

Oaths are solemn, ceremonialized promises tied to institutions and made before witnesses. In that sense, they are political statements. But oaths, as Storys and Rehnquists words suggest, are more than that. To make an oath is to swear not only to do what one has promised to do, but to do ones part to ensure that oaths carry a moral weight that surpasses all other promises.

For this reason, the Jan. 6 committees emphasis on oaths actedsometimes implicitly and sometimes explicitlyas a rebuke of Trump. As one of us has written, the former presidents self-regard and strained relationship with reality arguably makes him a person incapable of understanding or shouldering the moral weight required by the oath. Its telling that, when he spoke at the Ellipse on Jan. 6, Trump rhetorically embraced the Constitution before suggesting that it wasnt binding after all. At first, he referred to the Constitution that he had sworn to protect and defend again and again: Mike Pence is going to have to come through for us, and if he doesnt, that will be a sad day for our country because youre sworn to uphold our Constitution, he said. Were supposed to protect our country, support our country, support our Constitution, and protect our constitution, he added. But near the end of his speech, he effectively conceded that he is willing to dispense with the Constitution when, in his judgment, something has gone wrong: When you catch somebody in a fraud, youre allowed to go by very different rules.

In the first hearing, Cheney contrasted loyalty to the Constitution with the fealty Trump demanded to himself alone when she commented that, In this country, we dont swear an oath to an individual or a political party. We take our oath to defend the United States Constitution. The argument the committee is making here is not just that those opposing the big lie and battling the insurrection honored their oaths; its that Trump, and those who supported him, betrayed those promises. Or perhaps they were incapable of swearing them honestly in the first place.

Trump was not the only person involved in the attack on Congress who swore an oath. According to the latest count from the George Washington University Program on Extremism, 101 of the rioters so far charged by the Justice Department had military experience, meaning they swore a similar oath. Some of these were members of the perversely named Oath Keepers, one of the two extremist groups frequently mentioned throughout the first Jan. 6 hearing. Founded in 2009, the Oath Keepers actively recruit current and former members of the military, law enforcement, and other public safety positions to defend their extremist interpretation of the Constitution.

In a sense, the committee is presenting its own understanding of the oath as historically and morally rooted in a way that Trumps shallow invocation of the Constitutionand the Oath Keepers violent vision of governanceis not. And as members of Congress, the investigators are uniquely positioned to weigh in on that meaning. Or as Thompson put it of the committee members:

All of us have one thing in common. We swore the same oath, that same oath that all members of Congress take upon taking office and, afterwards, every two years if they are reelected. We swore an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

They believe themselves to be acting in service of their oath by conducting this investigation. As Thompson put it: I come before you not as a Democrat, but as an American who swore an oath to defend the Constitution. And in their argument, they, not Trump and not the Oath Keepers, are the true guardians of the oaths significance.

Understanding this helps untangle the main questions at the heart of the committees investigation: What is its aim? What would success look like? When these hearings end or when a report is released, there will be no formal pronouncement; Congress already failed to impeach Trump, and there is no jury to deliver a verdict. Besides, the committee has not defined its intended audience beyond vague and predictable references to the American people. Who is it trying to convince, and of what?

Some commentators have argued the committees work is primarily about marshaling the facts and telling the story, with an eye toward creating a historical record. More of them, though, are focused on how the committees work may translate into a criminal case that could be referred to the Justice Department for prosecution. This view implies that the committees investigation will have failed if, at the end of the day, it does not provide enough evidence or build a strong enough case to result in the indictment of Donald Trump.

But Thompsons and Cheneys repeated invocations of oaths suggests that the committee has a differentor at least an additionalpurpose. The first branch of government, after all, is neither a judicial power nor a body meant to take care that the laws be faithfully executed through criminal prosecution. And that is precisely why the committee can use the oath to frame its inquiry. An oath is not justiciable. The FBI cannot investigate adherence to oaths because they are not enforceable as codified law. A prosecutor cannot establish that an oath has been broken by proving certain legal elements beyond a reasonable doubt, and a judge cannot adjudicate it.

What the committee can do, though, is make a public case for Trumps having broken his oath of office and his manifest inability to swear that oath honestlyin other words, for the inconsistency of his actions on Jan. 6 with the Constitution, and for his unfitness to hold positions of public trust. It is not only an effort to prove the supremacy of their own interpretation of the oath or the Constitution it promises to support, but a plea to restore the sanctity of oaths in general. As Cheney said, [O]ur oath to defend the Constitution ... must mean something.

Just as the law lacks legitimacy unless those who make, enforce, and interpret it share a genuine commitment to treat it seriously, so too does an oath lack sanctity unless those who violate it are held to account. The committees emphasis is as much a referendum on Trumps fidelity to the constitutional oath as it is a commentary on the broader importance of oaths to the United States national identity as a country governed by the rule of law. To the committee, it seems the very future of the Republic depends in part on the oathif its leaders can keep it.

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Attitude-Altering Slippery Slopes: Just What Will People Infer from Past Decisions? – Reason

Posted: at 11:41 am

[This month, I'mserializingmy 2003Harvard Law Reviewarticle,The Mechanisms of the Slippery Slope.]

From Legislative Decisions.So far, I have argued that a legal rule may change some people's attitudes: People may apply the is-ought heuristic and conclude that if the rule exists, its underlying justifications are probably sound. And this conclusion may in turn lead people to accept other proposals that rest on these justifications.

Attitudes, however, are altered by the law's justifications as they are perceived. Say people conclude that A's enactment means that A is probably good, and that another proposal B is probably also good if it is analogous to A. Whether B is seen as analogous to A turns on which particular justification people ascribe to A, and see as being legitimized by A's enactment.

Consider, for instance, the tax for the support of Christian ministers that Madison condemned in his Memorial and Remonstrance. Madison reasoned:

Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish with the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other Sects? that the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?

People should therefore be wary, Madison argued, of power "strengthen[ing] itself by exercise, and entangl[ing] the question in precedents"they should recognize "the consequences in the principle," and "avoid[] the consequences by denying the principle."

But Madison's argument implicitly turned on the justification the public would infer from the law and accept as a "precedent" for the future. If the justification was, to borrow part of the statute's preamble, that the government may properly coerce people to do anything regarding religion, so long as such coercion supposedly has a "tendency to correct the morals of men, restrain their vices, and preserve the peace of society," then Madison's fears would have been well-founded. But if the justification was, to borrow another part, that the government may properly require people to pay a modest tax that will be distributed without "distinctions of preeminence amongst the different societies or communities of Christians," then his concerns would be less plausible.

Unfortunately, we often can't anticipate with certainty which principle a statutory scheme will eventually be seen as endorsing. Sometimes, the debate about a statute will focus on one justifying principle, and for some time after the statute is enacted, that will probably be seen as the principle that the statute embodies. But as time passes, the debates may be forgotten, and only the law itself will endure; and then advocates for future laws B may cite law A as endorsing quite a different justification.

Consider the installation of cameras that photograph people who run red lights. If the policy's existence will lead people to conclude that the policy is good, and will thus lead them to view analogous programs more favorably, what justification for the policyand thus what analogywill people accept?

Some people will infer the justification to be that "the government may properly enforce traffic laws using cameras that only photograph those who are actually violating the law" (J1). Others, though, may draw the broader justification that "the government may properly record all conduct in public places" (J2). Decision A (cameras aimed at catching red light runners) might thus increase the chances that decision B (cameras throughout the city aimed at preventing street crime), which J2 would justify, will be implemented. {This result would be especially likely if public opinion on B were already so closely divided that influencing even a small group of voters could change the result.} And if you strongly oppose B, this consequence would be a reason for you to oppose A as well.

This possibility suggests that Madison might have been right to consider the worst-case scenario in assessing how the tax for support of the Christian ministers might change people's attitudes. People might have seen it as endorsing only a very narrow principle, to which even Madison might not have greatly objected, but they might also have seen it as endorsing a much broader principle. And if one thinks that one of the potential B's that can flow from A is very bad, this may be reason to oppose A even if the chances of A facilitating that particular B are relatively low.

From Judicial Decisions.Judicial decisions, unlike many statutes, explicitly set forth their justifications, and might therefore have more predictable attitude-altering effects. But people might still interpret a decision as endorsing a certain justification even if that's not quite what the decision held, partly because many people don't read court decisions very closely or remember them precisely (again because of rational ignorance).

All of us have some experience with this phenomenon, where a decision is boiled down in some observers' minds to a brief and not fully accurate summary. Thus, for instance, in Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co., the Supreme Court held that an unusually narrow state "right of publicity" claim didn't violate the First Amendment, but repeatedly stressed that "[p]etitioner does not merely assert that some general use, such as advertising, was made of his name or likeness; he relies on the much narrower claim that respondent televised an entire act that he ordinarily gets paid to perform." Nonetheless, Zacchini is regularly cited for the very proposition that the Court explicitly refused to decide: that the more common version of the "right of publicity"the right to control many uses of one's name or likenessis constitutional.

Consider also Justice Holmes's statement that "[t]he most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theater, and causing a panic." This aphorism has entered common usage as an argumentendorsed by one of the great Justices, and one of the Court's earliest advocates of strong free speech protectionthat some kinds of speech ought not be constitutionally protected.

But most people quoting the phrase omit the "falsely," which changes the meaning substantially. {A LEXIS search in the NEWS;US file for "(shouting fire in a theatre or shouting fire in a theater or shouting fire in a crowded theatre or shouting fire in a crowded theater) and date(< 1/1/2002)" yielded 333 results. The same query with "falsely" before each "shouting" yielded only 72. Some of these results were false positives (for example, stories that used the metaphor more broadly than just in a free speech context, and the occasional story discussing the common omission of "falsely"), but only relatively few.} Under modern doctrine, for instance, falsely shouting fire would be punishable under the false statements of fact exception to free speech protection, while accurately shouting fire probably wouldn't be punishable. If Holmes's point were quoted precisely, it would provide little support for, say, restricting advocacy of anarchy, allegedly racist statements, or communication of private information about people. Many commentators, though, seem to have absorbed the principle in a form that's broader than its literal boundaries.

{See, e.g., Ad Generates Free Speech Debate at U. Colorado, Colo. Daily, Mar. 21, 2001 ("William King, a professor of Afro-American studies at CU, said that while free speech allows for ads [stridently denouncing the calls for reparations for slavery] to appear in print, common sense should keep them out. 'It's a whole lot like shouting "fire" in a crowded theater,' said King."); William Claiborne, Community vs. Klan in a Contest of Rights: City of Gary Seeks To Stave Off Rally by "Spewers of Filth", Wash. Post, Jan. 19, 2001, at A3 ("For his part, [the mayor of Gary, Ind., Scott L.] King on Wednesday said that for the Ku Klux Klan to come to Gary, where the population is 85 percent African American, 'gets pretty close to shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater, which in my view is not constitutionally protected speech."'); Michael Ko, Kirkland Sues over Police Data: Web Site with Officers' Personal Details Abuses Free Speech, City Manager Says, Seattle Times, Apr. 3, 2001, at B2 ("The release of home addresses and Social Security numbers is like 'shouting fire in a crowded theater."'); Carrie Smith, Board Denies Request for School Anarchy Club, Charleston Daily Mail, Oct. 30, 2001, at 5A ("A Sissonville High student's request to start an anarchy club at her school was overthrown by board members, who likened it to shouting fire in a crowded theater.").}

This tendency may be exacerbated when decision A is justified by a combination of factors, because it's easy for people's simplified mental image of the decision to stress only a subset of the factors. Consider, for instance, the pen register decision (Smith v. Maryland), which let the government getwithout probable cause or a warranta list of all the phone numbers that someone has dialed. The decision rested on three main justifications: the Court began by pointing out that the phone numbers didn't reveal that much about a conversation (J1); it ended by arguing that "a person has no legitimate expectation of privacy in information he voluntarily turns over to third parties" such as the phone company (J3); and in between, it included the following argument about people's actual expectation of privacy (J2):

[W]e doubt that people in general entertain any actual expectation of privacy in the numbers they dial. All telephone users realize that they must "convey" phone numbers to the telephone company, since it is through telephone company switching equipment that their calls are completed. All subscribers realize, moreover, that the phone company has facilities for making permanent records of the numbers they dial, for they see a list of their long-distance (toll) calls on their monthly bills. In fact, pen registers and similar devices are routinely used by telephone companies "for the purposes of checking billing operations, detecting fraud, and preventing violations of law." Pen registers are regularly employed "to determine whether a home phone is being used to conduct a business, to check for a defective dial, or to check for overbilling." Most phone books tell subscribers that the company "can frequently help in identifying to the authorities the origin of unwelcome and troublesome calls." Telephone users, in sum, typically know that they must convey numerical information to the phone company; that the phone company has facilities for recording this information; and that the phone company does in fact record this information for a variety of legitimate business purposes. [I]t is too much to believe that telephone subscribers, under these circumstances, harbor any general expectation that the numbers they dial will remain secret.

When the Internet tracking question arose more than twenty years later, however, justification J2 was nowhere to be seen, though the analogy to Smith was a big part of the debate. Had J2 been absorbed into people's attitudes, people might well have resisted the analogy, since J2 doesn't apply to Internet communications. But apparently Smith led people to believe that the warrant requirement should be relaxed whenever J1 and J3 were applicable. J2 was largely forgottenperhaps "[t]he people [did] not comprehend such subtleties." And the Smith decision may have thus led many people to accept a justification broader than what the opinion itself relied on.

What can judges who see this possibility do? Making their justifications explicit, and perhaps giving some examples in which the justifications don't apply, might help, but it might not be enough: consider, for instance, Zacchini, which explicitly refused to decide the constitutionality of the broad right of publicity, but which has nonetheless been read as deciding just that.

Another option is to ignore this risk. I have a duty to decide the case as best I can, a judge might conclude, without changing my reasoning based on a speculative (even if sensible) fear that some people in the future might oversimplify the reasoning.

A third option, though, is to consider the possibility of oversimplification in close cases. A judge who feels strongly about, for instance, a broad vision of free speech or the Fourth Amendment, might adopt a rebuttable presumption against changewhen it's a close question whether to create a new exception to speech protection or the warrant requirement, the judge might vote against the exception, because of the risk that even a carefully limited exception might later be oversimplified into something broader.

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Wheel Of Fortune To Become Standalone Online Casino – NJ Online Gambling

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According to the partners, more than 250 versions of Wheel of Fortune slot games have been introduced over the last 25 years. And its only appropriate that the launch will kick off sometime later this year in New Jersey, arguably the most innovative state in the U.S. when it comes to new gambling options. In May, fixed odds betting debuted at Monmouth Park, while esports enthusiasts can now legally bet on their favorite players and games.

Wheel of Fortune is watched nightly by millions of people, and BetMGM is honored to partner with Sony Pictures Television and IGT to bring this online casino experience to life, BetMGM Chief Revenue Officer Matt Prevost said in a statement. Once live, Wheel of Fortune Casino will offer players the excitement of their favorite game show and real money wagering in the palm of their hand.

Enrico Drago, CEO of Digital & Betting for IGT, added, Were excited to celebrate the evolution of the IGT Wheel of Fortune slot brand with BetMGM and Sony Pictures Television through the launch of Wheel of Fortune Casino. The Wheel of Fortune brand has been synonymous with slot gaming for more than 25 years, and this unprecedented brand-led online casino, driven by BetMGMs compelling platform and promotional capabilities, is well-positioned to engage and entertain new and long-time players.

Officials for BetMGM, which is headquartered in New Jersey, said that responsible gaming education remains a key focus for the company, including a partnership with GameSense and its responsible gaming tools.

While casino visitors like the Wheel slots because of their fondness for the game show, occasionally the machine provides a lot more than mere nostalgia. For instance, last September a female Jersey Shore resident playing a Wheel of Fortune Progressive Jackpot machine at Resorts casino on the Atlantic City Boardwalk won a whopping $1.64 million.

According to the state Division of Gaming Enforcement, there was a $101,000 winner on PlayMGMcasino.com on a Wheel of Fortune game on May 9 as well as an $80,000 Wheel winner at the Hard Rock casino on March 31 on a machine with a $100 denomination wager. And backon Feb. 9, a lucky Wheel player cashed $52,500 on Caesarscasino.com.

A key part of the game shows allure seems to be familiarity. Pat Sajak and Vanna White have been hosting and turning letters for four decades, so even those who may have not seen the program for a number of years can return to the same old game show without missing a beat.

Photo: Ed Komenda/Reno Gazette Journal

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Las Vegas Sports Betting Giants Roll the Dice on Hollywood Talent – Hollywood Reporter

Posted: at 11:40 am

Hollywood has come to accept that content is the primary weapon in the streaming wars. Quietly, as legalized online sports betting spreads across the country, content also has become the weapon of choice for digital casino operators and betting firms looking for that edge in what has been an expensive grab for consumer dollars. And content creators, from production companies to podcasters to established TV talent, are cashing in.It is the streaming wars version for casino operators, former Wall Street analyst Hal Vogel says.

Online sports betting has been on a steady expansion across the U.S. since the 2018 Supreme Court ruling in Murphy vs. NCAA paved the way for states to permit the practice. As each state legalized access to sports betting (its legal in 21 states, with another nine pending and others expected to follow), gaming operators jumped into the space, both digitally native firms like DraftKings, and legacy casino brands like MGM and Caesars. Even media companies entered the fray, with Fox launching FoxBet in partnership with Flutter (now owner of FanDuel).

But the expansion has proved to be expensive, with each state launch requiring a local marketing blitz. As anyone who lives in a state that has legalized sports betting in the past year or two would tell you, as soon as it becomes legal, TV ads, targeted digital marketing campaigns and mailed flyers proliferate. So gaming companies have turned to content as a point of differentiation. The result has been a flurry of deals covering podcasts, social media content like TikTok videos and Instagram pages, and even talent deals, as athletes, entertainers and sports media celebrities sign on with various gaming firms to produce originalcontent.

Most recently, Caesars Entertainment, owner of the famed Las Vegas casino resort and the Caesars Sportsbook mobile app, inked a deal with Peyton Mannings Omaha Productions to produce video and podcast content for its various platforms. Caesars big bet is that Peyton drives his rabid audience to its gambling platform and keeps them there, and away from others, says Peter Csathy, chairman of advisory firm Creative Media. Its all about customer acquisition and customer retention in an increasingly hyper-competitive online and offline world of gambling, gaming and crypto.

We do believe that consumers are smart, and it is much better to engage them with content and to let them get to know the world we are creating, Caesars Sportsbook chief marketing officer Sharon Otterman says. You dont have to keep hammering them over the head with this offer or that offer. It is a strategic way to build a relationship with customers, and to respect both sides of the equation.

It is, in the words of a finance world source, a wash, rinse, repeat cycle. Players come into the ecosystem because of the content, play, and then, hopefully, stay.

If anything, Caesars deal with Manning and his production company is the culmination of a years-long effort by betting firms to differentiate themselves through content. Penn National Gaming acquired a sizable minority stake in Barstool Sports in early 2020, and plans to become majority owner of the company next year. In addition to Barstool content like original podcasts, Penn also launched a Barstool-branded sportsbook.

Pat McAfee, the popular radio host and YouTube creator, inked a nine-figure deal with FanDuel last year to bring his program to the betting companys platforms. BetMGM struck deals with The Athletic, now owned by The New York Times, and Yahoo Sports, and Caesars hired former ESPN anchor Kenny Mayne in a content role, to name just a few deals.

Otterman says the company moved into content after it found that customers were tiring of the transactional experience of betting apps, with users saying the space felt more like a bank than the experience when you first walked into Caesars Palace.

Users enjoy and relate to talent and content on a different level than they do a game or betting app, and betting firms are more than willing to pay to secure that relationship for themselves. So far, many of the deals involve podcasts, and in particular podcasts that touch on sports, where the betting company is the presenting sponsor (and can also sell ad space). With sports podcasts already a top genre and betting already a frequent topic of conversation, the deals have proliferated. But deals for video content (again, usually sports-related), distributed on social platforms, YouTube, or within the apps and websites of betting firms, also have become morefrequent.

Former ESPN talent have been in particularly high demand. In 2021, DraftKings inked a multiyear deal with Meadowlark Media (co-founded by former ESPN chief John Skipper) to sponsor and distribute former ESPN radio host Dan Le Batards podcasts in whats been described as a mid-eight-figure deal. It is not a big leap for these companies to invest in media, because it gives them alternate ways to diversify their revenue streams, but also build their own audience and content, says Meadowlark Media COO Bimal Kapadia.

But more than anything, its about getting those consumers into their own ecosystems. It really is all about collecting those email addresses, says Joe Favorito, a sports media consultant and adjunct professor at Columbia University. Increasingly, content is becoming the most cost-effective way to achieve that result. As a high-level source on the content side of the business tells The Hollywood Reporter, online sports betting has reached a point where the street wants to see ways that are less cash-intensive to raise awareness and increase engagement for their platforms.

With much of the country on board or likely to launch legalized online sports betting in the next year or so, the localized land grab is giving way to more efficient national campaigns. The rapid growth of our footprint has opened up scale efficiencies that make some national initiatives accessible and attractive, whereaspreviously they were uneconomic because there was leakage into states where we were not active, BetMGM CEO Adam Greenblatt said at the companys May12 investor day.

That efficiency becomes more necessary as the country stares down a possible recession. Consumers are tightening purse strings, and sports bets could be an easy expense to cut. That environment could make content investments even more important, thanks to their inherent stickiness. Even if people dont make bets, they are likely to keep listening to podcasts or watching funny videos created by Manning or Mayne (like Maynes Betting 101 series for Caesars, which uses his quirky sense of humor to introduce betting concepts to users).

Dans voice, whether it is in a bear market or a bull market, is still relevant to his fanbase, Kapadia says of Le Batards loyal audience.

And the economics of the deals also work to help betting firms amortize their costs by selling other ads on owned podcasts or videos, or reselling content elsewhere if so desired. If betting companies can have their own content, or licensed or partnered content, they have an ability to lower those [consumer acquisition] costs because they can then recoup it through their own ad sales, their own licensing deals, their own partnerships, Kapadia adds.

Another content-side source notes that the strategy has already proven itself in between major sporting events, when, as one would expect, sports betting slows down. But consumers keep engaging with the content and return when things pick up. While a recession is certainly a different beast, the strategy shares a North Star.

We have no ambition to be a media company, that is not what we do, Caesars Otterman says, adding that increasingly the worlds of advertising and content are converging, and the best way that you can make sure a potential customer knows what we stand for, and to have an emotional connection to us, is to be immersed in our content.

And just as companies like Netflix, Disney, Paramount and NBCUniversal have found themselves in bidding wars for top-tier comedy and drama talent, betting firms are finding that authentic content from established names could be their ticket to consumer cash. Or at least their email addresses.

Gambling, gaming and crypto share the same opportunity and same dilemma, says Csathy. Consumers are willing to spend massive amounts of dollars, but they first need to know where to go spend that money.

Georg Szalai contributed to thisreport.

A version of this story appeared in the June 22 issue of The Hollywood Reportermagazine.Click here to subscribe.

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GC: Operators must interact with one in 12 online casino players – iGaming Business

Posted: at 11:40 am

The Gambling Commission has told operators to stop marketing to customers who spend a significant proportion of discretionary income on gambling, and that they should perform responsible gambling interactions with one in every 12 online gaming customers.

The Commission published guidance today (21 June) as a follow-up to its new rules for players at risk of harm, which were published in April. These rules, as outlined at the time, instructed operators licensed in Great Britain to ban marketing to customers deemed to be at-risk.

Licensees must also flag indicators of harm and take action in a timely manner, as well as implementing automated processes for strong indicators of harm.

At the time, the Commission announced that further guidance would come in June.

This guidance has not provided specific details of what an at-risk customer may be, but noted that a wide range of factors may play into determining this. This includes personal and demographic factors such as age and health, situational factors such as financial difficulties, behavioural factors including attitude to risk, market-related factors such as the type of bets placed and access, which related to factors such as literacy and numeracy skills.

Specifically, the Commission highlighted certain behaviours that are much more associated with harmful play, such as unmonitored overnight gambling.

Rather than mentioning specific thresholds that could apply across all customers, the Commission noted that operators need to do more to create tailored thresholds based on open-source information about their customers.

Historically, gambling licensees have not systematically considered customer affordability when developing their customer interaction policies, it said. Many have used deposit or loss thresholds as a main or sole prompt for a customer interaction, but these have often been set at levels that were inappropriately high, in comparison to the average amount of money that the majority of people have available to spend on leisure activities.

This has led to a number of examples of customers spending more than they could afford, and this not being identified sufficiently early, as seen in much of the Commissions compliance and enforcement casework.

Open source data exists which can help licensees assess affordability for their GB customer base and improve their risk assessment for customer interactions. Thresholds should be realistic, based on average available income for your customers.

However, the regulator added that most people would consider it harmful if they were spending a significant proportion of their discretionary income on gambling. Discretionary income, it noted, excludes essential costs such as housing and bills.

The Commission also said that further guidance on financial risk will come soon, but licensees should be considering how they manage those risks now.

Further clues of the Commissions definition of an at-risk customer came as the regulator noted that different types of gambling activity may require different strategies. Here, the regulator said that licensees must must take account of problem gambling rates for the relevant gambling activity, and perform customer interactions at minimum, in line with this level.

However, it noted that this provision cannot mandate the outcome of the interactions.

Quoting the 2018 Public Health England survey, it said that 8.5% of online gaming players are classed as problem gamblers, as are 3.7% of online sports betting customers and 1.3% of customers at lotteries other than the National Lottery.

If the licensees systems do not identify numbers of customers at least in line with the problem gambling rates for the relevant activity, those systems are likely to be failing to identify the rightproportion of customers, the Commission said. Operators must ensure that they are on track to meet the minimum levels of customer interactions over an annual period, and to do so should assess progress monthly.

This would suggest that the regulator would expect minimum interactions with more than one in 12 online gaming customers.

We will update the guidance over time where we consider it necessary to reflect recent problem gambling prevalence statistics, the Commission said.

The Gambling Commission recently announced it would launch a new method of measuring harm, following a pilot survey. This method found that levels of gambling harm were higher than in the PHE survey, but it cautioned that the survey should not be used as an estimate of problem gambling at this stage, for reasons including the fact that it appears to oversample gamblers compared to non-gamblers.

All of the new rules will come into effect on 12 September,

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Canterbury Park Gets Mystic With Northern Stars Turf… – Online Gambling

Posted: at 11:40 am

The center of the horse racing universe will migrate north to Minnesotas Canterbury Park on Wednesday, where the annual Mystic Lake Northern Stars Turf Festival offers five stakes and a rich smorgasbord of betting options.

Those options include an all-turf stakes Pick 5 that offers an industry-low 10% takeout. That 50-cent wager encompasses Canterbury Parks five turf stakes: races 3, 4, 6, 7, and 8.

The eighth race on the 10-race card is the featured $150K Mystic Lake Derby, sending its 11 3-year-olds a mile on the Canterbury grass. That $150K purse is the richest of Canterbury Parks season.

Theres also a Pick 4 beginning with the first race, an all-stakes Pick 4 encompassing races 5 through 8, and a late Pick 5 on the final five races. All come with that 10% takeout.

Based on horseplayer feedback from last years Festival, we put together a unique wager that features all five of the turf stakes races, Canterbury Park Senior Vice President of Racing Andrew Offerman said in a statement. It is a handicapping challenge we think fans will enjoy.

They certainly did last year. The 2021 Northern Stars Festival set a single-day handle record of $3,795,180.

Given the deep fields and intriguing entries in several races, that record is in jeopardy this year. The biggest racing day on Canterbury Parks schedule attracted trainers such as Brad Cox, Mike Maker, Tom Amoss, Greg Foley, and Ron Moquett. They, in turn, brought in A-list jockeys such as Florent Geroux, Javier Castellano, and the underrated Adam Beschizza, who will tangle with local products Jareth Loveberry and Roimes Chirinos.

Options abound on those multirace wagers. The $100K Lady Canterbury, $100K Dark Star Turf Sprint, and the $100K Curtis Sampson all drew 13 entries before scratches. The Dark Star Turf Sprint also has two also-eligibles. Meanwhile, the $100K Mystic Lake Mile drew 12.

The card really came together well. All the turf stakes drew full fields, Offerman said. The Northern Stars Turf Festival will be extremely competitive, with horses from Kentucky, local horses, horses from around the country. It should make for very exciting racing.

Six of the Mystic Lake Derby entries are Minnesota products, with Bens Malice (8/1) offering both value and the home-course advantage. Hes won twice on the Canterbury Park grass.

The two favorites are familiar names outside of Minnesota: Stitched (5/2) and Dowagiac Chief (4/1). Trained by Foley, Stitched comes in from his Churchill Downs stable after winning the May 18 Caesars Stakes at Horseshoe Indianapolis. Hes 4-for-5 on turf and 4-for-6 in 2022, but outside of a 98 in an allowance score two starts back at Churchill Downs, carries rather pedestrian Equibase Speed figures.

Amoss Dowagiac Chief, meanwhile, comes in off a last-place finish in the Grade 2 American Turf on the Kentucky Derby undercard. That came after he took the lead on a Churchill Downs turf course that was poison to front-runners that day. Before that, Dowagiac Chief finished a strong fourth in the Jeff Ruby Steaks on the Turfway Park synthetic and won the Black Gold Stakes at Fair Grounds by five lengths.

Before his 75 Equibase in the American Turf, Dowagiac Chiefs four previous Equibases were 95, 95, 97, and 92.

Other key stakes horses to watch are XY Speed (4/1) in the five-furlong Dark Star Turf Sprint Stakes, Schlofmitz (3/1) in the one-mile Curtis Sampson Oaks, and Saranya (7/2) in the one-mile Lady Canterbury Stakes.

XY Speed has Maker pulling the strings. Hes 5-for-19 in Canterbury turf stakes over the past four seasons. Along with that, you get Castellano in the irons and a horse who is 8-for-14 at this distance. Scholofmitz improved greatly in his last two races, clocking career-best 88 and 82 Equibases. The 88 came in his last outing, a solid third in a Churchill Downs May allowance.

Last year, Saranya won the Curtis Sampson Oaks, the 3-year-old version of this race. The Cox product, with his faithful jockey Geroux holding the reins, hasnt won since that Curtis Sampson score, but shes coming off a fourth by a half-length in a strong, 1 1/16-mile Keeneland allowance. That came with a career-best 105 Equibase.

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PSG Ready to Appoint Galtier as Head Coach, With Zidane Out of… – Online Gambling

Posted: at 11:40 am

Paris Saint-Germain will appoint Christophe Galtier as the teams new manager in the coming days. The PSG hierarchy will pay current head coach Mauricio Pochettino and his staff members a total of $16 million to end their contracts one year early. The official announcement of Pochettinos departure is expected on Thursday.

Nice will be paid $10.5 million to cover Galtiers release clause. The 55-year-old joined the club last year and guided Nice to fifth place in the League. The 12-month stint on the French Riviera followed an impressive four-year stay at Lille that ended with a Ligue 1 title in 2021. Previously, Galtier spent almost eight years as Saint-Etiennes boss.

Before closing in on Galtier, PSG offered the job to Zinedine Zidane. According to reports, the former Real Madrid manager hopes to become Frances manager at the end of the year, if Didier Deschamps departs after the World Cup.

Even though president Nasser Al-Khelaifi had Zidane as his first option, the newly appointed PSG sporting director Luis Campos preferred Galtier, whom he worked with at Lille. Campos replaced Leonardo this summer at Parc des Princes. His first important move on the transfer market could be the acquisition of Portuguese star Renato Sanches. The 24-year-old impressed in Lilles shirt and has Galtier among his admirers as well.

Tuchel and Pochettino both struggled with the task of creating a playing identity for PSG. Despite reaching the Champions League final in 2020, Tuchel was sacked months later and joined Chelsea, only to lead them to the supreme continental crown in 2021.

Pochettino, who also spent time at PSG during his playing days, was always a fan favorite in Paris. In the eyes of the PSG board, he was unable to get the best out of a team that was bursting with quality. The Paris giants went out early from the Champions League as early as the round of 16 and they were also eliminated from the French Cup, making a domestic double impossible. The French title served as little consolation, with Pochettino eventually paying the price for the teams failures.

PSG stands at -1000 to win another league next season, with second-favorite Marseille at +1100. Lyon comes third at +1400. Galtiers challenge will come in the Champions League, where he competed in just six group games with Lille in the 2019-20 season without winning any. His side won just a point after a 1-1 draw with Valencia, losing the other five matches (0-2 and 0-3 against Ajax, 0-2 and 1-2 vs Chelsea, and 1-4 in the return match against Valencia).

Despite Galtiers record, PSG is the third-favorite to win the Champions League this season in the bookies views. The French sit at +600 to lift the trophy, only behind Manchester City at +300 and Liverpool at +500. Bayern is behind PSG in the odds race at +650, as is Real Madrid at +1000.

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The Responsible Gambling Council Wants a "Culture of Responsibility" in the Online Gambling Industry – Pokerfuse

Posted: at 11:39 am

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We wanted the RGC to explore how gambling relates to other online activities, helping Playtech to improve how we support digital and mental wellbeing, as well as safer gambling.The Responsible Gambling Council (RGC) would like to see the online gambling industry have a shared sense and culture of responsibility, where both staff and player initiatives reflect player well-being, a recent whitepaper reveals.

The RGC is a non-profit organization that specializes in safeguarding in the gambling industry to promote the health of people and communities who might be affected by problem gambling. The RGC is based in Canada, but works globally throughout the industry.

The RGC report, Gambling Digital Tools Across The Player Spectrum, is an in-depth review of how responsible gambling tools are used throughout the online gambling industry.

It also includes recommendations on what the industry could do to shore up RG offerings. One key highlight: Online gambling operators should link staff and player initiatives to the uptake of responsible gambling efforts.

The report also highlights the ecosystem of digital gambling tools, reviews case studies of practical tools, discusses barriers of entry and areas of improvement, and outlines ways to improve responsible gambling efforts throughout the industry.

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Roker Roundtable: Should gambling companies be prohibited from appearing on club shirts? – Roker Report

Posted: at 11:39 am

Malc Dugdale says...

I do agree that having sponsorships from major gambling service providers isnt ideal, and I do think it should be phased out.

When I was a kid (a very long time ago, admittedly) sports such as Formula One were sponsored by the likes of Rothmans and John Player- famous cigarette brands of the time. The theory that led to their demise as sponsorship suitors is the same as the reasons the likes of Betdaq and Tombola should not have been on Sunderland shirts in the recent past, in my view.

We cannot be putting the names of questionable companies in places that can influence young and easily-led kids.

In addition, those who have issues with gambling certainly dont need reminding of the availability of it online 24/7 by seeing famous names from the industry plastered across the first team shirts of many teams featured on Match of the Day, EFL on Quest, or even live at games.

My only challenge to this position is: where do you stop?

I would use the same argument to suggest fast food providers (and the related convenient delivery companies) arent a great idea, due to obesity impacting the NHS, and the same goes for alcohol brands and confectionery companies.

One of the first brands I recall seeing in a shirt was the Crown Paints logo on the Liverpool shirt from the early to mid-1980s, and I cant see an issue with brands like that, but Im sure someone can.

Maybe this is yet another thing that the league needs to revisit and put some new rules around, but they cant even get the footballing basics right in places, so Im not holding my breath.

As a recovering gambling addict, I have a strong feeling about this: gambling companies should not be allowed anywhere near football memorabilia.

Quite a few years ago, the Football Association made the decision to ban tobacco companies from advertising, but believe me, gambling is a far worse problem.

Gamblers dont get vapes, gum or patches to help them quit. It is solely reliant on willpower not to walk into a shop and place a bet.

The industry is absolutely rife in football, and I cant watch a game on TV without several adverts popping up during half time. Does that set an urge off? You bet it does. Its an addiction that I have to live with every day. Ive seen what this addiction has done to people and done to me, and Id rather not be reminded of it when I go to a football match or watch it on TV.

I have absolutely no issues with people wanting to place a bet on football or any sport. It is fun when in control, but it is easy to lose that control and lose a lot of money.

No company that sponsors a potentially harmful product should sponsor football. I totally get Malcs point about fast food companies, and I really do think that the leagues and the FA need to look at the whole thing, and make decisions on exactly what they want to promote and via which brands.

For me, though, gambling companies should be nowhere near.

In many ways, I stand as Ant stands.

I turned to gambling a long time ago as a coping mechanism, and like most coping mechanisms, it starts out as a bit of fun/a laugh/nee bother really, but in hindsight, thats just an excuse.

Ive sought no professional guidance on the matter, but I eventually acknowledged that I had a problem when I emptied a bank account while attempting to chase my losses- something that happens all too often with people like me.

Im not intending to be preachy about it, either. If you have enough disposable income to do it and you have actual control over it, you can do what you please, and dont let my personal issues stand in your way.

We even flirted with it ourselves with an association with BETDAQ that, on reflection, disgusted all of us. I still feel dirty thinking about it, and no great profit was made from that association (which again is no excuse), but you live and learn - particularly as you watch the lives of your friends and loved ones fall apart around you.

However, theres a difference between accepting that something can genuinely be a fun pastime and ignoring the incredible damage that it has done to many in society who havent been fortunate enough to pull themselves away from what can be an incredibly slippery slope.

Gambling disproportionately impacts poorer communities, and why wouldnt it?

While it may offer nothing but the occasional flutter for many, it may offer both an escape from reality and the promise of no more worries about the dire financial situation you may be in, simply by pressing a button.

The entire industry- including all the games it runs and all the advertising it runs, is very intentionally marketed towards those with a weakness, and that weakness is a lack of wealth. A lack, despite your best attempts, of being able to stop worrying about a lot of lifes stresses.

Its presence at all football matches and sporting events, its meagre attempts at promoting itself as an ally of gambling addicts, and its relentlessly careless exposure to children...well, its like the BBC producers old approach to Jimmy Savile: you know theres something very disturbing about it all, but everyone else is ignoring it, so whats the use in saying anything? Just let Jim fix it for everyone and deal with the aftermath later.

In short, like Jimmy, its not something that anyone under the age of 18 should be exposed to.

For that reason, and a great many others that I wont go into, it shouldnt be present on the shirts of our greatest sporting institutions, and those in charge of such matters would do well to consider the long-term impact on their respective fans and families, and find something else to fund them in the short-term that isnt just money soaked in the blood of the many dead the industry has left in its wake.

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