The U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a ruling allowing a tribal-state compacts to include statewide online gaming won’t impact the timeline of California tribes pursuing sports betting in the future, but eases their path for adoption, tribal leaders said Wednesday.
The Indian Gaming Association hosted its New Normal podcast to talk about last week’s ruling by the high court, which decided not to take up an appeal of a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling. The lower court in 2023 allowed tribal-offered online wagering off reservations, saying that it didn’t violate the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988. The plaintiffs, West Flagler Associates and the Bonita-Fort Myers Corp., a racetrack and poker room operator, challenged the state of Florida, which had granted sports-betting exclusivity via a compact with the Seminole Tribe.
The decision, which sent shockwaves through the gaming industry, could pave the way for significant expansion of tribal gaming into sports betting and online casinos, analysts have suggested. Victor Rocha, a California trial member and chairman of the IGA’s annual conference and tradeshow who moderated Wednesday’s podcast, called the recent actions “a game changer” for tribes.
During the podcast, Jason Giles, executive director of the IGA, dismissed suggestions from Wall Street analysts and others that the decision allows states like California to pursue sports betting without a change in the state Constitution through voters.
James Siva, chairman of the California Nations Indian Gaming Association, was noncommittal on a date when tribes will return to voters to change the California Constitution by seeking approval for tribes to offer sports betting.
“I know there’s a lot of excitement over this decision and it was the right decision, but people think we’re going to start having a push for new initiative immediately (in California),” Siva said. “Luckily, we have a CNIGA meeting coming up this week and everyone realizes we’ll continue on the path we’ve been taking the last few years, moving carefully and methodically. This opens up some new avenues for us, but our timeline remains the same even with this decision.”
Giles asked if that meant 2026, but Siva didn’t give a date. Tribes have relied on public polling to help guide their decisions. Some observers have suggested it could be 2028 or 2030.
Since it will be a new form of gaming under IGRA, Siva said that 60% of revenue must go to tribal-government functions that serve members, such as health care.
“The approach by those billion-dollar corporations, wanting to leave crumbs on the table for tribes and take the majority of revenue out of the state, was never going to work for us,” Siva said. “This decision makes it a little easier. It’s going to be complicated, difficult, and expensive, but there’s a little bit more clarity today.”
Scott Crowell, a tribal-gaming attorney with Crowell Law Office Tribal Advocacy Group, said the Supreme Court’s letting stand the lower-court ruling is a big win for tribes.
“It makes it clear that tribes can engage in statewide mobile gaming under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act and don’t need to be at the mercy of state laws and legislatures in the way mobile gaming is conducted,” Crowell said. “A lot of dust has been kicked up on how it will play out, but had it gone the other way, it would have been devastating for tribes,” Crowell said.
Under new rules put in place in March by the Department of Interior that piggyback on the D.C. Court decision, Crowell said commercial gaming operators won’t be able to enter a state, use a tribe’s license, and take most of the revenue, as has happened for wagering offered outside IGRA. Those commercial operators, instead, could offer some back-of-the-house expertise to assist tribes in their operations.
“If they think they can continue with the unconscionable model they’ve been pursuing for so long in other jurisdictions (such as Arizona), I hope this decision is a wake-up call. That’s not going to happen,” Crowell said.
Siva hopes the latest decision forces these commercial operators to listen to California tribes and that’s already happening with some companies coming to the table.
“I hope this will put some force behind that and we’ll see some actions and not just words when they realize the models they used in the past won’t work in California,” Siva said. “Our careful approach, and protecting the industry we built up from nothing over the last three decades, mean more to us than adding another percentage to the bottom line. That’s always been and will continue to be our approach. They’ll have to listen to us a bit more.”
