West Flagler Requests Rehearing of Florida Sports Betting Decision

• West Flagler has petitioned for an en banc rehearing of a D.C. Circuit Court’s decision to restore a 2021 Florida gaming compact
• The gaming compact legalized online sports betting, craps, and roulette in Seminole Tribe-owned Florida casinos
• The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will not decide if an en banc hearing be granted

Florida sports betting will be further delayed. Whether its merely a few weeks or as long as a few months is now anyone’s guess, as West Flagler has submitted a request for an en banc hearing of a D.C. Circuit Court’s decision to restore a 2021 Florida gaming compact.

West Flagler, the plaintiffs in the hearing, had until midnight tonight to file a petition.

If they did not file a petition the official mandate restoring the Florida gaming compact would have gone into effect on Monday, Aug. 21, allowing the Seminole tribe to launch its Florida sports betting services, along with craps and roulette in its Florida casinos.

West Flagler Requests Rehearing En Banc

In late June, a three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the the District of Columbia unanimously agreed to overturn a ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Dabney L. Friedrich that declared a 2021 Florida gaming compact violated the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA).

The gaming compact was thrown out by Friedrich in November 2021. Ultimately, Friedrich determined the compact violated the conditions set forth by IGRA that limits tribal gaming to the confines of tribal lands. The Seminole Tribe argued in the gaming compact that because the servers that processed the online sports bets were located on tribal land, then the bets themselves were placed on tribal lands.

The three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the the District of Columbia disagreed with her ruling.

In West Flagler’s request, counsel for the plaintiff’s wrote that the Supreme Court’s ruling of Michigan v. Bay Mills Indian Community found the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) regulates gaming on “Indian lands, and nowhere else.”

“The Opinion is erroneous and will create confusion, and thus rehearing is warranted. The Opinion relies on an interpretation of an IGRA provision itemizing the ancillary subject matters that are permissible in an IGRA compact. As shown by both the plain text of this provision and the overall legislative purpose of IGRA, this provision cannot reasonably be read to allow IGRA compacts to contain provisions that on their face seek to authorize gaming activities off of Indian lands,” counsel wrote in the document.

If granted, the en banc rehearing will include all judges of the court, not just a three-judge panel, to hear the case.

A Seminole Tribe spokesperson told Sports Betting Dime through email that it’s important to remember that the original decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit was unanimously in favor of the Department of the Interior and the gaming compact approval.

“It’s important to note the three Judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued a unanimous decision in favor of the U.S. Department of the Interior, which approved the Gaming Compact between the Seminole Tribe and the State of Florida,” the Seminole Tribe spokesperson wrote.

Will Request Be Granted?

But just because an appeal is requested does not mean one will automatically be granted. Daniel Wallach, a gaming law attorney, Founder of Wallach Legal and UNHLaw Sports Wagering, recently told Sports Betting Dime that he expected West Flagler to continue their fight in one way or another, but face long odds to have an en banc hearing  granted.

En banc hearings are rarely granted by the U.S. Court of Appeals, Wallach said, as the court typically grants only one review for every 500 three-judge panel decisions. An en banc hearing has not been granted since 2021, he noted.

“The interpretation of a gaming statute is not on par with the kinds of issue the D.C. Circuit would typically grant a rehearing on. These are issues that present important federal constitutional questions, separation of power type issues, and this doesn’t strike me as the kind of case that reaches the threshold of being an issue of exceptional importance,” Wallach said.