Supreme Court docket Blocks Florida Sports activities Betting Plan Pending Attraction
It appears to be like like Floridians will not be legally betting on sports activities anytime quickly.
The Supreme Court docket constructing in Washington, DC. Chief Justice John Roberts this week stayed a Florida sports activities betting settlement to provide the courtroom time to contemplate the case.
The Supreme Court docket is placing on maintain a proposal that may have allowed the Seminole Tribe to open a sportsbook within the Sunshine State. That’s whereas it considers an attraction from native playing corporations against the association.
Chief Justice John Roberts late Thursday issued a keep in response to a request from West Flagler Associates and Bonia-Fort Myers Company, which function a South Florida pari-mutuel betting institution.
The transfer will additional delay authorized sports activities betting in Florida, and if the excessive courtroom decides to take up the underlying case, it received’t be resolved till someday subsequent yr. That may imply bettors might not have entry to authorized sportsbooks till after this yr’s NFL season, and even subsequent yr’s March Insanity school basketball event, sometimes among the busiest occasions of yr for sportsbooks.
Prolonged Authorized Combat
West Flagler has spent the final two years trying to reverse a 2021 settlement between the Seminole Tribe and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) that may have given the tribe a monopoly on sports activities betting within the state. Along with permitting sportsbooks on the tribe’s chain of Onerous Rock casinos, the gaming compact additionally would have allowed folks to guess on-line and through cellular apps wherever inside the state.
After the Inside Division, which oversees tribal gaming, allowed the compact to take impact, West Flagler sued in federal courtroom. It alleged that the deal successfully allowed for off-reservation gaming, which is prohibited by the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. Florida, Inside, and the tribe defended the legality of on-line betting by pointing to the bodily location of the pc servers accepting these bets, all of which have been on tribal land.
Sports activities betting was obtainable in Florida for 3 transient weeks in November 2021. That’s earlier than a federal decide first stepped in to dam the compact. That call was ultimately overturned on attraction, and final month, the US Court docket of Appeals for the Washington, DC, circuit declined to rehear the case, delivering a jolt of optimism to native gamblers.
Now, the trail ahead has once more been thrown into doubt.
Subsequent Steps
Roberts’ order didn’t embrace any reasoning for his resolution. He requests a response from the Inside Division to West Flagler’s preliminary keep request by October 18.
West Flagler additionally has dedicated to submitting a petition for certiorari by November 20, asking the courtroom to take up the case.
In the meantime, the corporate is also pursuing a separate authorized path within the Florida Supreme Court docket in a parallel try to invalidate the gaming compact. The courtroom has requested DeSantis’ workplace to file a response by November 21 in that case.
