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What started as a small group of outraged online poker players after the passage of UIGEA legislation in 2006, has turned into a full-fledged movement in the United States, as players, corporations, advocacy groups, and politicians are lining up to tout the need for legalized online poker in the US.

Online poker proponents can now claim three advocacy groups fighting for online poker legislation: The Poker Players Alliance (PPA); iMEGA; and the latest group to join the fight FairPlay USA. This is in addition to a number of mega-casinos that have now thrown their weight online poker legislation including Steve Wynn, and Caesar’s Entertainment.

The messaging varies from group to group –some pointing to tax revenue and job creation, others to civil liberties, and others to the need for regulation. For instance, Caesar’s CEO Gary Loveman recently said in an interview with Financial Times: “I can’t think of another example where there is something an American can buy that no American entity can provide.”

In Congress longtime pro-online poker politicians like Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), and Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), have been joined in the past year by Senator Harry Reid (D-NV), Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY), and Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX); even co-author of the UIGEA legislation back in 2006, Senator John Kyl (R-NV) has said he would be willing to reexamine the issue!

With the focus in the US government shifting from the debt ceiling to job creation, and with a lot of the focus now on campaigning, this could be the ideal time to attach legislation that would legalize and regulate the online poker industry to some type of job creation bill.