Florida's Sports Betting Launch Could Be Delayed

Earlier this summer, a U.S. District Court overturned a prior ruling that was preventing Florida's Seminole Indian Nation from offering retail and mobile sports betting. The original ruling was made under the guise that Indian Tribes are only allowed to offer sports betting if it's from Indian land. The fact the Seminoles were proposing the offering of mobile sports betting throughout Florida from servers located on the Tribe's land seemed to violate the law.

When the U.S. District Court rules that a lower court got it wrong, a new compact and ruling from Governor Ron DeSantis gave the Seminoles the green light to start accepting sports bets as soon as they were ready. Ready means having licensed sports betting operators in place to start taking bets. Due to prior attempts to start taking bets, those sports betting operators have already been in place and ready to go.

U.S. DC District Court of Appeals Might Intervene

West Flagler runs commercial gambling enterprises in the state of Florida. They have long opposed the fact that the Tribe's new compact would give the Seminoles the exclusive rights to offer sports bets in Florida. West Flagler wants a piece of that action.

With The Seminoles Hard Rock Cafe Casino preparing to start taking legal wagers by the start of the NFL regular season, West Flagler petitioned the U.S. DC District Court of Appeals to immediately intervene. It's not often that an appeals court will intervene in a ruling that was handed down by the U.S. Department of the Interior, the regulatory body that oversees Indian affairs.

It wasn't clear the Appeals Court would intervene until they recently (August 16, 2023) sent a request to the Seminole leadership, asking them to respond to an en banc petition made by Wesy Flagler. In the request, the Court gave the Tribe 15 days to respond. Furthermore, the response is not to exceed 3,900 words with nothing further being required of West Flagler at this time.

Based on the en banc petition response, the Court could decide to intervene and hold an appeals hearing. Florida gaming attorney Daniel Wallach told reporters with PlayUSA, that he still didn't expect the Court to move forward.

How Will This Affect the Launch of Sports Betting in Florida?

The Hard Rock Cafe has been moving forward with the goal of opening its retail and mobile sports betting windows on or before September 9. That's the first day of the NFL regular season. Even if they reply to the Court's request, they might find themselves having to delay any kind of sports betting launch. That would be very unfortunate for Florida residents who have been waiting a long time to legally wager on sports from home.

If the Appeals Court takes its time deciding whether or not to hold a hearing, that would put the Seminoles in an awkward position. If they were to go ahead and launch, it could anger the Court and sway them to hold a hearing.

With the start of the NFL season less than three weeks away, A lot of people around the U.S. will be watching this story closely.