While members of Washington’s gambling lobby have pinned an anti-Internet-gambling circular on a congressional staffer and a powerful Indian tribe, both have denied any involvement with its publication.

Last week, The Washington Post reported that Republican lawmakers had crafted a memo resuscitating the link between Jack Abramoff, the jailed uber-lobbyist, and a number of Internet gambling industry clients he served during the early-to-mid 2000s.

The anonymous memo, entitled “Legalized Internet Gambling: A Final Legacy For Team Abramoff???”, warns that the passage of Internet gambling legislation would legitimize Abramoff’s duplicitous legacy.

“While Jack himself is now imprisoned, many of his former associates continue to carry out Abramoff’s plan to legalize Internet gambling in the United States,” the memo said.

“With potential action looming on HR 2267 in the near future, could this group of former Abramoff employees and clients be on the verge of accomplishing one of Casino Jack’s greatest goals???”

Thus far, no politician or interest group has claimed responsibility for the 1,550-word polemic, which was to be used, in part, to rally Republican opposition ahead of a hearing for Representative Barney Frank’s bills, H.R. 2266 and H.R. 2267, last week.

That hearing, though, was cancelled due to a scheduling conflict.

Gambling lobbyists told GamblingCompliance that the circular was likely penned by the Morongo Band of Mission Indians, a staffer for Rep. Spencer Bachus, or both.

The Morongo, which have spoken out against Frank’s licensing bill since December 2009, recently saw their efforts to persuade the National Indian Gaming Association to publicly oppose federally regulated Internet gambling fall flat.

The association, comprised of 168 different tribes from around the country, voted 26-to-4 against taking a uniform position on Internet gambling, but another vote on the issue is scheduled for its next meeting in October.
 
The 'Team Abramoff' memo, seen by GamblingCompliance, takes aim at a wide range of Internet gambling proponents including the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians who, it claims, “have been rather unique in Indian Country with their support of legalizing Internet gaming… as tribes stand out to be big losers if Internet gaming is legalized.”

When contacted by GamblingCompliance about the memo, Morongo spokesman Patrick Dorinson said the Californian Tribe had nothing to do with it.

“Morongo has nothing to do with this memo, categorically nothing at all,” he said. “People should definitely get their facts straight.”

Meanwhile, Michael Borden, Bachus’ lead legislative adviser who was named by several lobbyists as a probable author, also denied being involved with the memo.

“That is unequivocally, 100 percent not true,” Borden told GamblingCompliance. “I did not write one word of that memo. I did not ask for that memo to be drafted. I had nothing to do with it.”

Borden’s connection to Internet gambling stretches back nearly six years – between 2004 and 2007, he helped his former boss, Representative Jim Leach, push prohibition bills through Congress.

Borden is senior counsel of the House Financial Services Committee, of which Bachus, a long-standing Internet gambling opponent, is the ranking Republican member.

Along with Bachus, lobbyists said Representative Eric Cantor – who, as minority whip, is charged with maintaining party discipline on key votes in the House – was initially supportive of the memo.

“Cantor, Bachus and others are using the memo for floor talking points and to bolster Republicans to unanimously oppose Frank's licensing bill, which will probably get a floor vote later this year,” one lobbyist said.

Lobbyists said that the anonymous memo is unlikely to receive the Republican Party stamp, however, because Cantor and other party politicos accepted campaign contributions from Abramoff or his clients between 2001 and 2004.

“The Abramoff memo is not an official G.O.P. document as far as we can tell, and in fact, we know the G.O.P. whip function have distanced themselves from it,” said John Pappas, who is executive director of the Poker Players Alliance.

It is not clear when a second hearing for Frank’s legislation will be pencilled in, but lobbyists said that the memo did not prompt Frank to reschedule last week.

Abramoff, a Republican, is well known on Capitol Hill for having bilked over $80m in lobbying fees from Indian tribes with gaming interests. He used that money to wine, dine and spirit lawmakers away on trips to destinations including Scotland and the Northern Mariana Islands.

In the early 2000s, he used contributions from eLottery Inc., a Connecticut-based Internet lottery technology provider, to defeat an anti-Internet-gambling bill sponsored by Representative Robert Goodlatte.

Abramoff pleaded guilty to corruption charges in Federal District Court in Washington in January 2006, and was handed a four-year prison sentence by that court in September 2008.