Long at the forefront of casino gaming, especially when it comes to the Native American population, the Seminole Indians of Florida have traditionally been hard core negotiators. With both the federal and Florida governments, the Seminoles have more often than not come out on the winning side when it comes to negotiations over their sovereign gaming rights. Now the Seminoles are looking to stretch that reach even further.
The Seminoles Look to Online Gaming…
Since 2010, the Florida Seminoles have had a compact with the State of Florida which grants them exclusive gaming rights inside the Sunshine State. This compact, which paid 12% to the state on profits up to $2 billion and 15% on profits over $2 billion, was renewed in 2015 by then-Governor Rick Scott (it was originally negotiated and enacted by Governor Charlie Crist). The compact has been a fitful one, however, as Florida has expanded gaming in other areas.
Dog and horse racing, long a part of the Florida landscape, were threatened by the Seminole dominance in casino gaming (otherwise known as Class III gaming) and wanted something for themselves. They were first allowed to deal poker in the mid-2000s and, in 2010, saw the limits removed from their games to allow for No Limit poker to be dealt. This brought a windfall to these poker rooms and the Seminole Indian casinos that dealt poker also.
Now the Seminoles are looking to the future and that future is online gaming. New negotiations for the compact between the Seminoles and the state of Florida are underway under new Governor Ron DeSantis and it seems there is plenty to discuss. The Seminoles are looking to take exclusive rights for online gaming and other table games, but those new gaming options are going to come at a price.
…But is the Price Too High?
Dog and horse tracks have been creeping into the Seminoles virtual monopoly on gaming by dealing “house banked” games such as blackjack and three-card poker (the poker rooms are arguably circumventing the laws by making a player at the table the “house” rather than the casino). These games have long been the domain of the Seminoles and have been a huge bone of contention between the tribe and state officials. The racing tracks – which will see dog racing end in 2020 after a constitutional amendment was voted through in 2018 – need revenues and, if the Seminoles are wanting the rights to online gaming, these operations are wanting something for their efforts.
The racetracks are looking for something that could be a windfall to those operations. Long a host for pari-mutuel betting on horse and harness racing across the country, these outlets would be allowed to offer sports betting if the new Seminole compact is signed. Additionally, poker rooms at these establishments would be able to go 24/7 and be able to offer and receive a 10% reduction on taxes for slot machines.
Seminoles Dealing from Position of Power
The Seminoles are in the driver’s seat with these negotiations because of the money they contribute to the state of Florida. The compact between the two entities calls for more than a billion dollars in revenues be paid from the Seminoles gaming operations to the state, money that the state needs in its budget. The Seminoles also hamstrung the legislature from being able to move on casino gaming with a constitutional resolution passed in 2018.
That resolution, known then as Amendment 3, proposed that any further gaming actions in the Sunshine State would have to go before the entirety of the state’s voters. If there were any moves for casino gaming, they would have to earn 60% of the citizens’ vote to be able to move forward. That resolution was passed by a wide margin in the November 2018 midterms and etched in stone that any changes to gaming would have to go through the vote of the people.
The Seminoles lobbied significantly for the passage of this Amendment because it would have a direct impact on their monopoly in the state – if a city could simply pass a law and erect a casino, their exclusivity for gaming would be destroyed. They were joined by an unlikely partner, the Disney Corporation, who fought for the Amendment because it would protect their “family friendly” enclave in Orlando from casino gaming. Between the two, more than $35 million was spent persuading the people of Florida to vote for the Amendment, which they did under the auspices of “the people” being in control of gambling.
Would Amendment 3 Fall Under Compact?
The big question is would any newly negotiated compact between the Seminoles and the Florida legislature need to be approved under the Amendment 3 constitutional law? Under the way the Amendment was written, the Florida legislature is barred from authorizing any other gaming without passing it through the people first, and the compact would have to be approved by the legislature and Governor DeSantis. But Florida politicians have shown a tendency in the past to ignore their constituency…could this be another occasion where such an act occurs?