Earlier this summer, Sheldon Adelson told those nasty little Internet gambling punks to get off his lawn. Now, he thinks they egged his house. As payback, the chairman and CEO of Las Vegas Sands Corporation says he’ll put online gaming out of business forever in the United States.
Adelson, 80, who is ranked 11th on the Forbes 400 with a net worth of $28.5 billion, is opening his wallet to fight what he once dubbed “a toxin all good people should resist.”
He’s forming an advocacy group, the Coalition to Stop Internet Gambling. He’s hiring Washington, D.C., lobbyists and public relations experts. He’s enlisting the help of former elected officials. Adelson is armed with a public opinion survey directed by a noted Republican pollster that says 67 percent of Americans oppose legalizing Internet gambling.
A public campaign showing online wagering as a danger to children, poor people and those with gambling addiction is being readied. By the way, did we tell you that Adelson is the founder and 53 percent owner of Las Vegas Sands, which has casinos in Las Vegas, Pennsylvania, Macau and Singapore that produced more than $11 billion in revenue last year?
Adelson plans to take his anti-Internet gambling message to Congress and state capitals to quash any legalization efforts. But stopping online casino expansion isn’t enough. Adelson wants Congress to outlaw all Internet gaming.
For all of the millions of dollars he says he’ll spend on his campaign, Adelson will have as much success forcing a federal ban as a hand of ace high has versus a full house. He just isn’t holding the cards.
Internet gaming is not going away, no matter how much money Adelson throws at his new holy war.
