Just throwing this out there from experience. Club Open tournament many years ago. Back then the person doing the polygraph would ask for your fishing license to take the polygraph. Gentleman that won the tournament could not find his license so as a club we disqualified him because of not having a valid license on him. To make a long story short, we lost a lawsuit because the courts ruled that since he had a valid license just not on his person he was legal. I don't know all of the details but signed waver did not seem to mean anything and it showed us that you didn't have to actually have the license with you to be deemed legal.

I'm not saying that the DQ was unjust or wrong in anyway, I agree with it, I'm just saying that I agree with Jake that its a bad look for the trail, especially since they awarded him the trophy then took it back lol. These tournament trails are businesses so I think that its reasonable to consider checking licenses to avoid this type of problem again.

disagree....this is not black and white,there is a reasonable chance the man did have a legitimate license that the system failed to properly record or execute....similar situation happened in small town near here...young man on his way home from college late at night was stopped by police because their tag reader indicated his car was not insured....young man explained,my family has four cars and we recently changed insurance companies and the system must not have been updated....they slapped him in jail and his father had to come pay the fine to get him out of jail and it took several weeks to get his fine returned...similar deal happened here several years ago and game warden told one of our friends they had been told to hold off writing hunting license tickets due to problems with system..I know about that time,I tried to renew my license and H.I.P. stamp on line and couldn't so ended going to Walmart and their guy told me he had to renew licenses for a bunch of people that week that had same problems as me...
pure and simple,the penalty is far too severe in this situation and I believe it is going to cost the tournament trail some entries....

Every time I read a thread like this I always wonder why anyone would voluntarily choose to get into the business of running bass tournaments.

Amen

In 2023 you will receive a conformation and receipt of purchasing a license electronically in the state of Texas. Not sure about Georgia. In Texas it is pretty cut and dry if you have a license.

If you are a plumber, electrician or even a doctor is it ok to do your job unlicensed? If you do not take personal responsibility of the simplest and most straight forward tasks involved in your vocation, you probably need to change vocations.

Not really sure how you are arguing, either yes you have a license or no you do not have a license. It's kind of like a woman being pregnant, she either is or she is not.

I pretty much agree with you here but the fact that you're comparing tournament fishermen to plumbers, electricians and doctors is hilarious....

The license process is basically exactly the same in every state from Texas to the Carolinas. Buy online, print or take a picture of the confirmation page after purchase, check the email confirmation. Tourning pros can do it in their sleep. Nobody's fault but the angler involved that he didn't check his confirmation.

let's back up and ask the question,...why are they checking to see if every tourny entrant has a fishing license?....the answer is.. years ago when tournaments first got started, game wardens thought bass tournament would be great opportunity to write a lot of tickets...they would come out in force,aggravate the hell out of everybody by running up and interrupting guys trying to fish sometimes running across an area where the guys were casting.....this gradually stopped for several reasons,number one was that they wrote very few tickets because bass fishermen rarely were without a license and some tourny directors would inform game and fish dept prior to tourny that they were checking licenses prior to take-off....
back to original question.....because of liability issues,tournament directors need to enforce life jacket and insurance requirements but they do not need to get involved in requiring fishing licenses anymore....leave that to law enforcement people...

You can’t buy a car without having a drivers license…….. so why can you enter a pro tournament without having a license…..

I have never once been checked for a fishing license or ask the question during a polygraph if you’re gonna check after an event you might as well save yourself the trouble and have it checked before. It’s not that hard to comprehend

So…anybody else know anybody that was locked up for no proof of auto insurance???

They don't ask if you broke any state or federal laws during the polygraph?

Only if they were drunk.

Hell I think they should have locked him up, maybe confiscated his truck and boat, suspend his license for 5 years, that will learn him.

How in the world did you make that up?
You do not need a DL to buy a car