FanDuel’s Nigel Eccles said its lawyers will try to persuade Attorney General Eric Schneiderman over the next five days that their business is lawful and that its 500,000 customers in the state should be able to keep playing.
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“The attorney general’s decision to ban DraftKings and FanDuel is completely wrong”, Murray said in a statement.
“We are going to use every avenue to stay open”, Eccles said.
Shucks, we’re just people connecting people, and taking a cut for making it possible. Representatives from those websites maintain the position that daily fantasy sports betting is a skill-based game, not a chance-based game.
On the opposite side of the country, Nevada shut down daily fantasy sports sites last month, and in California, mounting state legislation could deal a similar blow, despite residents who disagree with the concept of an all-out ban.
“None of us was really surprised by the Attorney General’s conclusion”, he continued.
Both companies have advertised heavily in the past, and it was unclear if the move was related to Schneiderman’s action. Another such company, DailyMVP, has announced it won’t accept play from New Yorkers.
If the industry fails to head off Schneiderman’s civil suit, it would probably seek a preliminary injunction from a NY State court declaring that daily fantasy sports don’t violate the state’s gambling laws. “Please acknowledge the receipt of this notice and confirm you are updating all location controls to block players from this jurisdiction”.
“This is the beginning, not the end of the legal process”, said Marc Zwillinger, counsel to FanDuel, to reporters on Wednesday. She was not immediately available for comment. That law makes it federally illegal to run a gambling business that operates in violation of state law.
The tone Wednesday among financial companies was of uncertainty. The legal question is still the giant one… “It’s a complicated jurisdictional analysis”.
FanDuel said at the time that it would “welcome the opportunity to work with Rep. Zalewski and lawmakers in IL to safeguard consumers” and ensure “that sports fans across IL can continue to play fantasy sports”. An American Express spokesman added the company relied on merchants to follow applicable laws, a sentiment echoed by Mastercard.
Two nephews of Venezuela’s powerful first lady are facing arraignment in NY after being arrested in Haiti on charges of conspiring to smuggle 800 kilograms of cocaine into the US, people familiar with the case… Could the companies or their employees face legal action just for being in New York, even if they stop interacting with NY customers?
In the games, fans pay to compete for daily cash prizes based on imaginary teams assembled from rosters of real players, which accumulate points based on how those players perform in actual games.
Only FanDuel and DraftKings were named in the attorney general’s order, which said the games constitute illegal gambling and are subject to criminal penalties. “It truly is putting your money on the table and gambling it away”, said Daniel Theal of Buffalo. The current scandal began on September 27th when data about player selections leaked from DraftKings-and then an employee with access to those data won $350,000 in the same week at FanDuel. Both companies said the worker, Ethan Haskell, couldn’t have altered his winning entry after accessing the information.
The Boston Herald remarked that over 20 lawsuits have been filed against the companies, a few of them at state level.
The leagues hope the daily fantasy partnerships drive more eyeballs toward their games.
Schneiderman was pleased by the smaller operators’ decisions to cease operations in NY.
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While there was no bombshell back-and-forth on DFS between former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, the latter not qualifying for the main debate, Schneiderman’s ruling will certainly have national consequences.
