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Bill Filed To Broaden Sweepstakes Ban On the first day of the new legislative session, Sen. Don Vaughan (D–Guilford) filed a bill to further strengthen the state’s prohibition on video gambling that was revisited in 2010, but has been the center of some confusion after a local judge ruled that a portion of the law is unconstitutional. SB 3—Broaden Sweepstakes Law seeks to expand the law created under last session’s HB 80—Ban Electronic Sweepstakes in order to clarify that any video gambling machines that violate the “intent” of that ban are prohibited. SB 3 argues that efforts across the state to subvert the intent of HB 80 by creating sweepstakes games that do not technically “take the form of game play or simulated game play,” which is prohibited by the current law, “still create the same poverty, addiction, and corruption to which House Bill 80 was directed.” Therefore, SB 3 would add to the current statute a provision making it “unlawful for any person to operate, or place into operation, an electronic machine or device to conduct or promote a sweepstakes.” This additional language aims to prohibit “any mechanism that seeks to avoid application of this section through the use of any subterfuge or pretense whatsoever.” It would also implement a felony punishment for multiple offenses. If enacted, the bill would go into effect immediately. “The Senate should take up and overwhelmingly pass SB 3 as soon as possible,” said Bill Brooks, president of the North Carolina Family Policy Council. “The General Assembly has consistently stood in opposition to the legalization of gambling in the state—with the notable exception of the lottery—and this bill simply supports and bolsters that stand in light of the gambling industry’s ongoing attempts to subvert that intention by wiggling their way through every minor technicality or loophole they can conjure up.”Related resources: Copyright © 2011. North Carolina Family Policy Council. All rights reserved.
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