California’s online poker prospectors find only fool’s gold

California’s once hopeful online poker prospectors continue to find nothing but fool’s gold in the Golden State.

Earlier this week, California Assemblyman Reggie Jones-Sawyer confirmed one of the industry’s worst-kept secrets: namely, that state legislators don’t intend to expend a whole lot of effort attempting to pass an online poker bill in 2017.

Jones-Sawyer, a longtime online poker proponent, also confirmed the not-so-secret cause of this lack of legislative interest, telling Online Poker Report that the state’s fractious online poker stakeholders – tribes, cardrooms, horseracing operators and poker technology providers – needed to get on the same page before taking another run at exasperated legislators with bigger fish to fry.

As ever, Amaya Gaming’s PokerStars brand remains the fly in this ointment, with some tribes and cardrooms advocating for (and partnering with) Stars, and other tribes insisting that they’re willing to stick with the status quo of no online poker if Stars’ participation is the price of admission.