Just when many members of the online poker industry thought it was a forgone conclusion that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie would sign an intrastate internet gambling bill into law, he hopped on New Jersey 105’s “Ask the Governor” radio program on Tuesday night and cast a world of doubt. Now, whether he’ll sign the bill into law or veto it for a second time isn’t clear.

—

Daily fantasy sports is legal to wager on in most states in the USA. Check out DraftKings.comfor your shot at turning $1 into $100,000 today. Visit DraftKingstoday.

—

“It’s sitting on my desk,” Christie said of the internet gambling bill about 45 minutes into Tuesday night’s program. “I have to make a decision very soon. I haven’t made a final decision yet, but there are two things I’m concerned about. First is I don’t know that it really will help Atlantic City. I’m concerned that it may drive traffic away from Atlantic City, that if people can gamble in their own homes on their laptops, why are they going to go to Atlantic City? I think that’s contrary to what we’re trying to accomplish here.”

Christie then said he was fearful that addicted and problem gambling would engulf the Garden State, telling listeners, “Secondly, I’m also really concerned about setting up a whole new generation of addicted gamblers. If you can sit on the edge of your bed with your laptop and gamble away a paycheck, that’s a lot different than making the conscious decision to go down to Atlantic City to a casino.”

A study from Harvard University quoted in a 2011 Covers.com story revealed that the growth of gambling doesn’t automatically translate to the growth of problem gambling: “The study concluded that the dramatic increase in the number of casinos in the United States has not led to a corresponding increase in the percentage of compulsive gamblers. To the contrary, over the last three-plus decades, said the report, the percentage of problem gamblers, when compared to the total number of gamblers, actually declined from 7 in 1,000 to 6 in 1,000.”

The same study added, “There is no evidence that gambling online increases the risk of becoming addicted.”

Christie (pictured) summarized by saying, “I haven’t made a final decision yet, but I have those two concerns and you should know that’s the way I feel. It’s in part the reasons that I vetoed the bill before in addition to some ways it was constructed that I thought made no sense either. I’m taking a close look at it. I was reading it over the weekend and reading the briefing from my staff in depth and I’m going to have to make a decision in the next couple of days.” Christie vetoed a similar measure in 2011.

The current bill addressed some of the concerns raised in his March 2011 veto and was passed by a 2:1 margin in the New Jersey Assembly and an 11:1 margin in the state’s Senate.

Listening intently on Tuesday night was Poker Players Alliance Vice President of Player Relations Rich TheEngineer Muny, who told PocketFives on Wednesday, “On the plus side, it was great that the poker community was able to get the question on the air. We are far better off knowing the Governor’s concerns here than had we not known. On the other hand, it was certainly a tough answer for us. It’s now up to the community to keep up the outreach to ensure Governor Christie hears from all of us.”

Christie recently signed a bill expanding New Jersey’s gambling portfolio to include wagering on sports, a law that the Federal Government and major sports leagues have objected to. Christie addressed the law, which will likely result in a lengthy court battle over its constitutionality, in his New Jersey 105 appearance, but did not express concern that it would increase the number of addicted and problem gamblers.

In a Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearing in 2012, PPA Litigation Director Patrick SkallagrimFleming testified that online and live gambling aren’t mutually exclusive: “All the preliminary evidence strongly suggests that there is a healthy relationship between online poker and live poker. Poker is, at its core, a social game of person against person. Hence, poker players as a general rule enjoy both settings and use one to compliment the other. While there are some poker players who prefer live games and some who prefer online games, the majority play both with equal enthusiasm.”

Chris Moneymaker’s win in the 2003 World Series of Poker Main Event, for example, caused an explosion of online and live poker.

If Christie were to veto the intrastate internet gambling bill for a second time, that could be all she wrote for the foreseeable future. State Senator Raymond Lesniak, who is the driving force behind the bill in New Jersey, told CardPlayer this week, “You only bang your head up against the wall so many times.”

We’ll keep you posted on the latest poker legislation news. You can react to this story by leaving a comment here or posting in this PocketFives thread.

Want the latest poker headlines and interviews? Follow PocketFives on Twitterand Like PocketFives on Facebook. You can also subscribe to our RSS feed.