Federal District Court Sides with Prior Circuit Court Opinion on Wire Act Interpretation

In a win for the online gaming industry, the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island has entered an order in International Game Technology PLC et al. v. Merrick B Garland & The United States Department of Justice1 siding with the groundbreaking and infuen-tial interpretation of the Wire Act2 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in N.H. Lottery Comm'n v. Rosen3 ("NHLC II"). THE DISTRICT COURT DECISION Plaintifs, International Game Technology and IGT Global Solutions Corporation (collectively, "IGT"), sought a declaratory judgment that a 2018 Department of Justice ("DOJ") opinion (the "2018 Opinion"), which held that the Wire Act applied to all forms of bets or wagers (implicating online lottery ticket sales in the process) only prohibits sports wagering activity. [...]the 2011 Opinion opened the doors to interstate internet wagering on games like slots, table games, and poker. In the June 3rd Order, the New Hampshire District Court found that the language of the Wire Act was ambiguous as to whether the limitation "on any sporting event or contest" applied to all four prohibitions in Section 1084(a).6 Looking at the context and structure of Section 1084(a), then, the New Hampshire District Court concluded7 that the reading of the Wire Act language underlying the 2011 Opinion provided a more coherent interpretation of the entire subsection and "construes the Wire Act in harmony with another gambling statute that Congress enacted the same day as the Wire Act (i.e., the Interstate Transportation of Wagering Paraphernalia Act).8 The New Hampshire District Court next turned to the legislative history for the Wire Act and concluded that it, too, supported the interpretation underlying the 2011 Opinion.