Poker Nm

Poker in Albuquerque & NM Welcome to PokerAtlas — home to everything you need to know about the Albuquerque poker scene. Join PokerAtlas now to share poker trip reports and find the best poker rooms in your area. New Mexico Regional Poker Information More States Shutting Down Casino Industry In Response To COVID-19 Surge New Mexico Joins Five Other States In Sports Betting Market Crazy Gambling Story: New. There are 10 poker rooms in the Mexico area, and we at PokerAtlas provide complete and up-to-date information about every room in every location including Chihuahua, Ciudad Victoria, Guadalajara, Mexico City, Monterrey, Riviera Maya, and Tijuana. Now, on top of the five live poker rooms in the state, several online New Mexico poker sites have opened up for business. You can now play your favorite poker games without ever stepping foot outside your house, your hot air balloon at the annual festival, or that retro Route 66 diner with the killer milkshakes.

Live poker is popular in New Mexico, with tournaments filing up fast and a thriving cash game scene. The poker rooms are split between tribal casinos and State licensed venues, which are the more recent developments. Most of the poker action is centered around Albuquerque and the other major cities here. Social poker games are not carved out under NM laws, though free entry bar leagues and charity poker events do run here.

Recommended New Mexico Poker Site

This article gives you a broad based overview of all poker game formats in New Mexico. First of all you’ll find an overview of the live casino poker rooms in this State and what they have to offer. Next social poker is covered, including home, bar and charity poker activities. Online poker is the subject of the next section and after that you’ll find information straight from the New Mexico Statute books. At the end of this page there is a high-level summary and a look at possible future scenarios for poker games here.

Live Poker Games In New Mexico

There are currently 9 poker rooms to choose from in casinos in New Mexico, most of these in tribal casinos and mainly based around the major cities in this State. These are very popular venues, with some major tournament tours selling out fast to poker hungry residents. The WSOP Circuit, and Heartland poker tour both stop in casinos in NM, though you’ll find plenty of tournament and cash game action around the clock too.

With several poker friendly neighboring States including Colorado and Arizona, residents of New Mexico are never too far from a legal poker game.

Are Home Games Legal In New Mexico?

Even though this State is otherwise very poker-friendly, there is no carve-out under the law for social home games. The prevailing attitude seems to be that small stakes social games where nobody is profiting from running the games are rarely busted – though you should be aware that technically you are breaking the law here by participating in a game like this.

Bar Poker leagues run in New Mexico. The key factor which allows these games to thrive is that there is no entry fee involved. The small prizes give are usually offered by the bars, that benefit from the extra food and drinks served while the tournament is running. Charity poker events are also allowed in New Mexico, though these will need to be individually approved before taking place.

Online Poker Games In New Mexico

There is nothing in the State laws to explicitly outlaw online poker games (or online gambling in general). Curiously, this State cites the Federal UIGEA laws as making online gambling illegal. In fact this law only relates to financial transactions between banks and gambling site operators. It is not known if this is a misunderstanding, or whether the New Mexico authorities believe that enforcement of internet gambling law is a federal responsibility and not their concern!

New Mexico residents are welcomed by all of the offshore poker sites, who offer cash games and tournaments from the Caribbean. These sites are legal in their own countries, and are enjoyed by thousands of US players every day. Bear in mind that the question of whether playing at these sites from NM is legally unclear – though nobody has ever been prosecuted in this State for merely playing in an online poker game.

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There is little evidence to suggest that the New Mexico government is actively looking into the regulation of online poker games. Conversely, there is a little to suggest that, once poker is seen to be working elsewhere, this State should not join in later down the line.

What Do The New Mexico Gambling Statutes Say?

New Mexico makes the ‘bet’ the key component of their definition of illegal gambling. The standard ban-all then carve-out system is in place here, and games involving skill are also covered by the wording on the Statute books. In addition to gambling itself, passing information which is related to gambling is also considered to be illegal here.

Here is the key passage relating to poker, the definition of a bet from section 30, 19, 1:

…means a bargain in which the parties agree that, dependent upon chance, even though accompanied by some skill, one stands to win or lose anything of value…

New Mexico Poker – Summing It Up

While moderately poker-friendly, the lack of provision for home-games is a glaring omission from the laws in New Mexico. Much of the poker action is driven by tribes who have negotiated deals (compacts) with the State to build lavish casinos on their land.

New Mexico do not appear to be in any hurry to regulate online poker, though there is no reason why this State could not join a later wave of regulated States once the concept has been proven elsewhere.

Here’s how the statute reads which prohibits gambling in the state of New Mexico:

“Gambling consists of (A) making a bet; (B) entering or remaining in a gambling place with intent to make a bet, to participate in a lottery or to play a gambling device; (C) conducting a lottery; or (D) possessing facilities with intent to conduct a lottery. Whoever commits gambling is guilty of a petty misdemeanor.” (1)

So it’s the part that refers to “making a bet” that is pertinent to the legality of real money poker playing, so we now turn to their definition of “bet”:

“”Bet” means a bargain in which the parties agree that, dependent upon chance, even though accompanied by some skill, one stands to win or lose anything of value specified in the agreement.” (2)

There are several things that the definition of bet does not include, bonafide business contracts and the like, and this also includes “betting otherwise permitted by law.”” (3)

It needs to be noted though that the definition of bet in New Mexico does leave the door open to poker being understood as predominantly a game of skill, and there are several court rulings that have indeed found this to be the case.

It’s hard to say what the exact intention of the lawmakers were here, but if they were looking to include poker, they could have put it the same way several other states have, where any element of chance would include it, where chance is relied on in whole or in part or to any material degree.

These statutes are written by lawyers and if they did indeed want to slam the door on any element of chance they could have very easily written it in.

The definition, as it reads, would probably include games such as blackjack and some other casino games where skill is an element but they are largely determined by chance. Whether poker is similar though is a matter of quite a bit of debate, and it really depends on how you look at the game, in addition to how you interpret this definition as well.

It will suffice to say though that simply by looking at the way the law reads here, we cannot be certain whether betting on poker would fall under the crime of gambling in new Mexico or not, and this will depend on the way the courts see it.

How Does This Cash Out For Poker?

To date there has not been any decisions made by the courts in New Mexico regarding whether poker is predominantly a game of skill or chance so in spite of the confidence that some commentators have that it is a game of chance and therefore wagering on poker constitutes illegal gambling, as discussed, things are not so clear.

If we look back to a 1960 decision in State of N.M. v. Larue, we see that the law cited in the case looks considerably different to the current law, which listed quite a few types of games which were unlawful to play or operate, and poker is listed among them. (4)

So this law later became changed with no reference to poker these days, and also now includes the rather ambiguous reference to what role skill may play.

This could be viewed either way. On the one hand it may be argued that since poker was listed as a game of chance in those days that at least specified that the intention at one time was to classify it as such. On the other hand perhaps this intention changed which prompted the legislature to remove the reference to poker and rewrite the statute so that it may be reasonable to exclude it.

In any case, in the absence of any judicial clarification, we would have to say that playing poker for money may be illegal in New Mexico, with the operative word being “may.” Given a judge friendly to poker, it is very conceivable that this could be seen as being excluded on the basis that poker is found to be predominantly a game of skill and not chance.

Playing Poker In New Mexico

New Mexico law does allow for regulated gambling, and they certainly do have that in this state, including several legal and regulated live poker rooms. The fact that a state has regulated poker by the way does not mean that unregulated poker is illegal, it just means it is not regulated, so that’s no help here.

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For instance it may be against the regulations to operate an unlicensed poker room but that does not mean playing poker would therefore be illegal, as operating an establishment and playing a game are two separate things.

If playing poker for money is illegal in New Mexico, then all poker playing for money not authorized by law is illegal, including penny ante home games. Unlike some states, there are no provisions in the law to allow for social gaming or any other non commercial forms.

New Mexico does have a total of 9 legal live poker rooms, mostly centered around the larger population areas of Albuquerque and Santa Fe. The largest is the Sandia Poker Room in Albuquerque with 15 poker tables, with the rest being more modestly sized. Tournament poker is particularly popular with New Mexico residents but there’s plenty of cash game action to be had as well. (5)

On the online side, while there is currently no intention of regulating online poker in New Mexico at the present time, there is no real reason why this would not be a possibility in the not too distant future.

Online Poker in New Mexico

However, the future is now for the large number of New Mexico poker players who have chosen to take advantages of the opportunities that currently exist. While the huge poker sites have packed up and left the United States, there still remains some very good choices if you know where to look.

Poker Mi

We do have a couple for you to have a look at should you reside in New Mexico and are interested in playing some online poker, so we present to you our two top recommendations for New Mexico residents, Ignition Poker and Americas Cardroom.

Both have been offering online play to New Mexicans for a number of years now, and when other poker rooms ended up leaving they preserved their dedication to serving this market as well as most states in the U.S, in addition to other countries all around the world.

So click on the links to our reviews to learn more.

References

(1) 2006 New Mexico Statutes, 30-19-2, Gambling

(2) 2006 New Mexico Statutes, 30-19-1, Definitions Related to Gambling

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(3) ibid.

(4) State of N.M. v. Larue

(5) All Live and Online Poker Rooms in New Mexico

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