The same competing tribal, racetrack and card club interests that made it so hard to craft an agreement on online poker in California is putting the brakes on any action this year to legalize sports betting in the Golden State.
The smart money is on the issue remaining undecided at least until 2020, the year that proponents of an initiative to amend the state constitution are aiming at for putting it on the ballot.
Knowing full well that tribal gaming interests will oppose anything but making sports betting part of the existing monopoly of Indian casinos, a political consultant who represents California’s card rooms, online gaming companies and sports leagues is working to qualify a campaign to being collecting signatures.
Meanwhile a bill on sports betting is languishing in an Assembly committee. After the U.S. Supreme Court struck down PASPA, lifting the ban on sports betting, several states went into high gear to legalize it. The first to do so was Delaware and New Jersey. About 20 states are mulling a similar action.
California’s multi-layered gaming landscape makes a similar action problematic. The state has the largest Indian casino market, which was $8 billion last year. The tribal state gaming compacts give tribes the exclusive right to offer casino games, except poker.
In a statement that has been quoted many times since he issued it, Steve Stallings, chairman of California Nations Indian Gaming Association, drew a red line: “California voters have, on numerous occasions, confirmed the exclusive right of California tribal governments to operate casino-style games. Legalization of sports betting should not become a backdoor way to infringe upon exclusivity.”
He told Axios, “They’re going to continue to have a dialogue with the stakeholders and try to arrive at a solution for everyone to take advantage of the opportunity.” Without that, he says, it could take years to reach a conclusion.
Left unsaid is the fact that, outside of Nevada, casinos have not offered sports betting.
The exclusivity demand has meant that, despite 10 years of efforts, online poker remains a goal not a reality in California.
But tribes in California and elsewhere see sports gaming as a threat that could cost them a significant cut of their profits. If they aren’t guaranteed exclusive rights, they say, their state tribal gaming compacts need to be renegotiated and the percentages that they pay to the states reduced.
