Internet Gambling Prohibition Act

The Internet Gambling Prohibition Act (IGPA) was a 1999 bill in the US Senate to ban Internet gambling.

A new version of this legislation was attached to the SAFE Port Act and became law in 2006.

In 1999, eLottery, inc. hired Jack Abramoff's lobbying firm, Preston Gates & Ellis, to represent their effort to block the bill. ELottery, an Internet-based firm, intended to sell state lottery tickets online, and this business venture was threatened by the IGPA. Abramoff recruited Ralph Reed, his College Republicans cohort, and Rev. Louis P. Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition to oppose the legislation. Although Reed was a former Director of the Christian Coalition which now supported the bill, Abramoff suggested a strategy for opposing the bill on the basis of exceptions in the bill for horse racing and jai-alai. Reed and Sheldon later claimed that they did not know that they were effectively doing this work on behalf of a gambling corporation. These claims contradict email exchanges between Abramoff and Reed which discuss eLottery and its parent company, eLot in 2000 and 2001.