| |  | | | | |  | By Daniel Webster, dWeb.News
| If the gaming compact is ratified by the state Legislature next week and later approved by federal regulators, it would make Florida the largest state in the nation to legalize sports betting. Additionally, the Tribe would be the exclusive operator of the digital sports books in Florida for the next 30 years. The Tribe would also be allowed to build three more casinos on tribal property in coming years.
| In exchange for all the components of the agreement, the Tribe would give the state a minimum of $500 million in annual payments, an amount that could go up as the market and profits expand.
| Most notably, the compact modernizes the gaming industry through the authorization of sports betting in Florida through the Tribe. The agreement also provides protections for pari-mutuel operations and the opportunity to participate in sports betting offered by the Tribe.
| "This historic compact expands economic opportunity, tourism, and recreation, and bolsters the fiscal success of our state in one fell swoop for the benefit of all Floridians and Seminoles alike," said Governor DeSantis. "Our agreement establishes the framework to generate billions in new revenue and untold waves of positive economic impact. I would like to thank Seminole Tribe of Florida Chairman Marcellus Osceola Jr., Senate President Wilton Simpson, and House Speaker Chris Sprowls for their collective commitment to modernizing the gaming industry in the state of Florida and setting the bar for the rest of the nation."
| "The Seminole Tribe of Florida is committed to a mutually-beneficial gaming compact with the State of Florida and looks forward to its approval by the Florida Legislature, the Seminole Tribal Council and the U.S. Department of the Interior," said Marcellus Osceola Jr., Chairman of the Seminole Tribe of Florida. "The Tribe wants to express our sincere thanks to Governor DeSantis, Senate President Simpson, House Speaker Sprowls and many others who have worked hard to negotiate a historic agreement that cements our partnership with the state for decades to come."
| This arrangement, however, brazenly flouts the 1988 federal law which allows states and Indian tribes to enter into compacts for Class III gaming activities, such as sports betting. That federal law—known as the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (or "IGRA" for short)—mandates that any gaming activities authorized under a tribal-state compact occur only "on Indian lands," which is specifically defined by IGRA to mean "all lands within the limits of any Indian reservation" or any lands held in trust by the United States for the benefit of any Indian tribe. The new compact, however, authorizes an extensive amount of gambling off tribal lands—essentially every online sports bet made in State of Florida and all sports wagers initiated from state-licensed pari-mutuel facilities.
| This "off-reservation" piece will likely spawn two parallel litigation tracks—one brought in a Florida state court asserting that sports betting outside of Indian lands violates the Florida Constitution's prohibition against non-voter-approved casino gambling, and the other filed in a federal court contending that the same activity also violates IGRA's strict requirement that all "gaming activity" occur solely on Indian land.
| "The historic new thirty year gaming compact Governor DeSantis and the Seminole Tribe of Florida executed today restores the State's relationship with the Tribe, preserves and offers new opportunities for Florida's legacy pari-mutuel industry, and provides substantial new revenues for the State of Florida," said Senate President Wilton Simpson. "I'm grateful to Governor DeSantis for his leadership in finalizing this compact and look forward to our upcoming special session to address legislation related to the implementation of this monumental agreement and to ratify the compact."
| "For years, there has been much ambiguity around the compact with the Seminole Tribe of Florida," said House Speaker Chris Sprowls. "Today, we thank Governor Ron DeSantis for bringing that to a conclusion and for giving us the opportunity to address this key issue for our state. Thank you also for the work of Chairman Marcellus Osceola Jr. and the contributions of Senate President Simpson. We look forward to reviewing the compact in an upcoming Special Session."
| | Larger and more expansive than any other gaming compact in U.S. history, the agreement increases the projected revenue to the State of Florida from the Seminole Tribe from no revenue to over six billion dollars over the next decade, with a guaranteed minimum of two and a half billion dollars during the first five years. | |  | "We Seminole have lived in Florida for thousands of years. Our ancestors were the first people to come to Florida. Our ancestors were connected by family and culture to others across North America, from the Atlantic coast to the Mississippi river, from the Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes. They are now called the Mississippian Culture, and their traditions still exist among the Seminole and other tribes today," the Tribe states.
| "We were in Florida when the Spanish arrived. They met our ancestors, who they called by different names; the Miccosukee people, the Muscogee people, the Calusa people, and other Native American tribes," according to the Tribe's website. "The Spanish brought with them diseases that devastated our ancestors. Within one hundred years the new diseases had killed nine out of ten of the Native People of the Americas."
| By some estimates, sports betting is expected to create over 2,200 jobs for Floridians.
| | A copy of the compact is available HERE. | | | | | | | | |
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