Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians oversees several casinos, including this one in Palm Springs.
In a victory for card rooms around the state, a Sacramento Superior Court judge has tentatively dismissed a lawsuit by Indian tribes that sought to bar card rooms from offering blackjack-style games, which the tribes say are their exclusive domain.
The Aug. 8 opinion by Judge Lauri Damrell marks another chapter in the decades-long disputes between tribes with casinos and California’s non-tribal card clubs. Damrell’s ruling, which she labeled tentative pending further arguments, concludes the state law that forms the basis of the tribes’ legal action, Senate Bill 549, is preempted by a federal law governing tribal gaming compacts, the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA).
The plaintiffs in the case, including the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians in Palm Springs, argued that SB 549 applies only to games played by non-tribal entities in non-tribal locations. So it falls outside the scope of the IGRA.
SB 549 was signed into law last year and provides tribes with a three-month window to file lawsuits in Sacramento Superior Court over certain card room practices.
The card room defendants, however, disagreed with the plaintiff’s narrow view of SB 549, arguing that the tribal gaming rights central to the litigation are the result of the tribal-state compact process that’s laid out in the IGRA.
The IGRA compact process is the sole means to establish tribal gaming rights, including the right to bar non-tribal entities from operating so-called banked games that are the domain of the tribes, according to the card rooms’ legal filings.
“Plaintiffs’ interpretation of SB 549 is compelling at first blush,” Damrell’s opinion states. “However, it requires divorcing SB 549 from its own language and legislative history, the history of this longstanding dispute, the gravamen of (the) plaintiffs’ complaints and Congress’s intent behind IGRA. Notwithstanding the Legislature’s attempt to resolve this issue, this court is bound by federal preemption and lacks jurisdiction to resolve this dispute.”
The attorney for the tribes, Adam Lauridsen, indicated in an email to the Southern California Record that the litigation is not over.
“As a factual matter, Judge Damrell has not adopted her tentative ruling,” Lauridsen said. “Following argument on it, she asked for additional briefing and set a further hearing for Oct. 10.”
The plaintiffs stressed that the tribes bargained with the state to obtain an exclusive right to offer banked games such as blackjack, baccarat and pai gow poker in California. The card rooms’ decision to offer such games violates state laws and denies tribes the rights they won during negotiations, the plaintiffs have argued, and the status quo has the effect of reducing the casino revenues the tribes are entitled to.
Under California’s current agreements with tribes, the tribal casinos are given the exclusive right to oversee card games using “house” money – that is, the casino serves as the bank. Card clubs, however, hire third-party proposition players (TPPPs), independent businesses that are licensed by the state, to act as a bank.
The tribes have argued in the lawsuit that the arrangement amounts to illegal banked games that violate the state constitution.
