New Gambling Reform Group FFOG Names Board and Courts Problem Gambling Councils as NCPG Seeks a Leader

Families and Friends of Gamblers, a Boston nonprofit built by the tobacco litigator Richard Daynard's institute, has named a 10-member board it says has no connection to gambling interests and is recruiting from the problem gambling councils around the National Council on Problem Gambling. It is a rival pitch rather than a split inside the council, timed for a moment when the NCPG has no permanent leader in sight.

• Families and Friends of Gamblers (FFOG) and the Public Health Advocacy Institute (PHAI) named FFOG's initial 10-member board on 6 October, chaired by Northeastern University law professor Richard Daynard, and said every member has "no connection to gambling interests or the sports/betting industry"
• The announcement "calls on all those involved in problem gambling councils to join FFOG", and cites the Kalshi-related exits from the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) and the resignation of executive director Heather Maurer
• FFOG secretary Dr Harry Levant said it was "likely no coincidence" that the NCPG had never opposed a position taken by the gambling industry or sports leagues since the PASPA ruling in 2018, a claim the council's own recent statements cut against
• FFOG is not new: PHAI launched it at the US Capitol on 6 November 2025, months before the NCPG took $2 million from Kalshi, and its "Truth and Integrity" campaign started in Washington on 23 September with Senator Richard Blumenthal and Representative Paul Tonko
• The NCPG's newsroom has posted nothing since it announced Maurer's resignation on 26 September; she leaves on 16 October, and no successor or interim leader has been named there

A Public Health Group Names Its Board and Makes Its Pitch

Families and Friends of Gamblers announced its initial board on Tuesday 6 October in a release issued from Boston with the Public Health Advocacy Institute, the legal research centre at Northeastern University School of Law that created it. The chairman is Professor Richard Daynard, PHAI's president, best known for product liability litigation against the tobacco industry. Mark Gottlieb, PHAI's executive director, is co-treasurer, and Dr Harry Levant, PHAI's director of gambling policy, is secretary, although a quote later in the same release calls Levant treasurer.

The other seven are W. Gordon Douglas, a former accounting firm tax partner; activist Franny Maguire Glomb; tax attorney John Hanamirian; Dr Deborah Haskins, a counsellor who has served as president of the Maryland Council on Problem Gambling, according to conference biographies; behavioural healthcare executive Michelle McIver; financier Dr Thomas J. Powell; and Pennsylvania attorney Brian Quinn.

The pitch is aimed at the existing problem gambling network, which the release invites to join "an independent, public health approach". Gottlieb added: "You don't have to leave other organizations, nor do you have to agree with all of our positions." Casino.org, which first reported the announcement, says FFOG will not accept contributions or memberships from gambling companies. The release does not say how FFOG is funded beyond PHAI's support, and no budget has been disclosed.

The Charge Against the NCPG

The release frames the board as a response to "growing questions about the influence of funding from gambling companies, sports leagues and prediction markets on the gambling reform movement". It recites the prediction markets membership category the NCPG created after a $2 million investment from Kalshi, and the withdrawals that followed from the Michigan Gaming Control Board, the Ohio Casino Control Commission, the Evergreen Council on Problem Gambling in Washington state and the Nevada Council on Problem Gambling.

"As industry money has flooded the gambling reform movement, the effects can be shocking," Levant said. "For instance, it is likely no coincidence that since the Supreme Court struck down PASPA the NCPG have never opposed any position taken by the gambling industry or the sports leagues." PHAI and FFOG also describe the industry's "Responsible Gaming" model as "scientifically flawed", arguing that it places the burden of harm on consumers.

The NCPG had posted no response by Wednesday. Its latest statement on funding, from board president Derek Longmeier on 22 September, says "many of our members and donors are gambling operators", that donor engagement "does not mean endorsement", and that funding gives no one control over its research, advocacy or positions. The same statement calls prediction markets "functionally gambling", a view Kalshi disputes, according to Axios as reported by PlayUSA.

Not a Breakaway, and Not New

Casino.org headlined the story as the NCPG's leadership splintering; the documents do not show that. PHAI launched FFOG at the US Capitol on 6 November 2025, according to Northeastern's announcement at the time, six months before the Kalshi agreement. Daynard said then that the gambling industry had "largely followed Big Tobacco's playbook".

Its current campaign, "Truth and Integrity: The Movement for Gambling Reform", began in Washington on 23 September with Blumenthal and Tonko, who used it to promote the SAFE Bet Act's federal standards for sportsbooks and the Prediction Markets Security and Integrity Act, which would move oversight of the markets from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to the states, according to Casino.org. The American Gaming Association argues that states are best placed to regulate gambling.

The Funding Line Is the Product

What FFOG is selling to state councils is one sentence: no industry money. That answers the complaint the departing regulators and councils made about the NCPG, which was less about its analysis of harm than about the association. But the purity has a cost and a lean of its own. The NCPG says operator funding lets it work "despite the lack of federal funding", and FFOG has disclosed no comparable budget. PHAI also formed the Center for Public Health Litigation, a nonprofit law firm whose targets include what the release calls "deceptive gambling practices". A movement whose founding institute litigates against the industry is independent of it, but it is not neutral, and councils weighing a move should see that.

Levant's Charge Is Easier to Make Than to Test

The claim that the NCPG has never opposed the industry since 2018 is asserted, not demonstrated, and the council's 22 September statement cuts against it: calling prediction markets functionally gambling put the NCPG on the opposite side from its own Platinum member. The stronger version of FFOG's argument is the governance one the Evergreen council made in September, that the Kalshi money was accepted without prior review and approval by the NCPG board, according to published excerpts of its letter. That is a question about how decisions are taken, and whoever the NCPG hires next will answer it, not a rival's press release.

The Timing Exploits a Vacuum

The board announcement landed 10 days after Maurer's resignation and 10 days before her departure. State affiliates are the council's base, and FFOG has addressed them directly while the national body has nobody permanent to answer. If the councils that have already left start appearing alongside FFOG, the fracture will be real. For now it is an invitation.

The NCPG's critics now have an organisation, a board and two members of Congress behind their campaign. What they do not yet have is a single state council that has publicly joined them.