When the pandemic caused all 100 cardrooms in California to shut down while many gaming tribes kept their casinos open, the tribes discovered an interesting thing: the Golden State cardrooms were siphoning off some of their profits, Gambling News reported February 22.
Data collected during the months when the Covid-19 pandemic raged, backed up the tribes’ arguments that the card clubs are infringing on the exclusivity over specific casino games that the tribes are guaranteed by the California constitution.
The tribes have alleged for decades that this exclusivity is violated when card clubs offer banked card games where individual players act as the bank.
This has led the tribes to lose more than $100 million a year, they claim. This claim was made during the Western Indian Gaming Conference at the Pechanga Casino Resort attended by representatives of the tribes. It was detailed further by USBets.
At the conference a tribal attorney talked about a bill in the legislature (Senate Bill 549) that would guarantee the exclusivity and noted the data that came to light during the pandemic.
At that conference Pechanga Chairman Marc Macarro, who is also president of the National Congress of Native Americans, said the tribes need SB 549. “We just need to be able to get into court and make our case,” he declared.
