The Biden administration along with the Seminole Tribe is urging an appeals court to reinstate an agreement giving the tribe control of sports betting throughout Florida.
This news comes nearly nine months after a Washington DC-based judge ruled that the 30-year agreement violated federal law. A US Department of the Interior brief filed earlier this week defended the administration's decision to allow the gambling agreement, also known as a compact, to go into effect.
This agreement was signed by Governor Ron DeSantis and Seminole Tribe of Florida Chairman Marcellus Osceola Jr. last year and was ratified by the Florida Legislature in a special session.
After it was ratified, owners of Magic City Casino in Miami-Dade County and Bonita Springs Poker Room in southwest Florida filed a lawsuit stating that the sports betting plan would cause a “significant and potentially devastating” impact on their businesses.
The sports-betting plan is designed to allow gamblers in Florida to place bets online. From there the bets will run through computer servers on tribal property.
The compact stated bets made in Florida “using a mobile app or other electronic devices, shall be deemed to be exclusively conducted by the tribe.”
US District Judge Dabney Friedrich ruled in November that the plan violated the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act by allowing gambling off property owned by the Seminole Tribe.
She went on to invalidate other areas of the compact and found that Interior Secretary Deb Haaland made an error when she allowed the deal to go into effect in the summer of 2021.
The compact would also allow the Seminole Tribe to add three casinos to its property in Broward County.
