Is Talking about Online Gambling Illegal?
Last June, Deputy Assistant Attorney General John G. Malcom sent a letter to media trade groups warning their members could be breaking the law by accepting ads for gambling sites. More recently, Raymond W. Gruender, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, convened a grand jury in St. Louis that is issuing subpoenas to companies that do business with the online gambling industry. This campaign of intimidation already has yielded results. In March, Google and Yahoo! stopped carrying ads for online gaming sites. Yahoo! said “a lack of clarity in the environment” makes gambling ads “too risky.” These companies have surrendered their First Amendment rights without a fight, allowing the government to silence speech it doesn’t like by floating a legal theory that almost certainly would fail if it were tested in court. “There is concern that gambling advertising may create the impression among the public that these activities are legal, when in fact they are not,” Justice Depa
