Florida Sports activities Betting: West Flagler Asks State Supreme Court docket to Intervene
Florida playing pursuits who oppose a plan to present the Seminole Tribe unique management of sports activities betting within the state are asking the state’s highest courtroom to step in.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks in New Hampshire on June 1, 2023. DeSantis is being taken to the state’s highest courtroom over his determination to present the Seminole Tribe unique entry to sports activities betting in Florida. (Picture: The New York Occasions)
The house owners of two South Florida gaming institutions are asking the Florida Supreme Court docket to successfully invalidate a Class III Tribal-State Gaming Compact with the Seminole Tribe. The compact, signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) in 2021, would give the tribe a monopoly on sports activities betting within the state by means of its current casinos and on-line Laborious Rock Wager sportsbook.
The compact has been on maintain for many of the previous two years amid an ongoing federal courtroom problem. West Flagler Associates, which operates the Bonita Springs Poker Room in South Florida, has been main that case. Nonetheless, its choices are dwindling following a sequence of losses on the US Court docket of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit earlier this 12 months.
Opponents consider the gaming compact violates the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act by permitting off-reservation gaming by means of the cellular sportsbook. Supporters of the deal say it’s authorized as a result of the sportsbook pc servers accepting bets could be situated on tribal land.
Federal Court docket Avenues Dwindling
West Flagler didn’t persuade the complete D.C. Circuit to rehear a choice by a three-judge panel upholding the tribal gaming compact, leaving the US Supreme Court docket as its solely remaining outlet for federal intervention. The corporate has requested the D.C. Circuit to remain its ruling to permit it to mount a Supreme Court docket attraction.
The Division of Inside, which regulates tribal gaming on the federal degree, advised the D.C. Circuit in a submitting this week that additional delay could be inappropriate.
In its preliminary ruling, the appeals courtroom panel “makes explicitly clear that the Compact doesn’t purport to—and as a matter of regulation, couldn’t—authorize the gaming actions outdoors Indian land that West Flagler believes are unlawful, and that West Flagler’s dispute is as an alternative with the Florida regulation that does authorize these actions,” Inside wrote in a submitting Monday.
“West Flagler’s assertion that this Court docket’s opinion nonetheless raises questions of outstanding significance rests on the identical misreading of the opinion superior in its unsuccessful petition for rehearing en banc.”
State Writ Sought
Now, West Flagler and its allies are taking their case to the best courtroom within the Sunshine State.
In a petition filed on Monday, West Flagler asks the Florida Supreme Court docket to difficulty a “Writ of Quo Warranto” directed at DeSantis and state legislative leaders, declaring that they violated the state structure by permitting the tribal gaming compact to go ahead.
The petition argues that DeSantis and the state legislature violated the Florida Structure’s requirement that any off-reservation playing be topic to a statewide poll earlier than going into impact.
The Seminole compact represents “a transparent enlargement of on line casino playing in Florida with no voter-approved constitutional modification by residents’ initiative, as required by Article X, Part 30,” petitioners argue.
Petitioners ask the courtroom to declare that DeSantis and the legislature have exceeded their authority and that the one technique to enable off-reservation sports activities betting in Florida is by placing a constitutional modification on the poll for voters to approve.
