The Florida legislature has now approved a gaming deal that aims to bring legalized sports betting to the third-most populous state in America. It will do so, however, in a way that will be unique to the Sunshine State, by putting it under the control of the casino-owning Seminole Tribe.
Florida's Senate on Tuesday voted 38-1 in support of a bill ratifying the new, 30-year gaming compact that was announced in April by Republican Governor Ron DeSantis and the Seminole Tribe of Florida. The state's House of Representatives on Wednesday voted 97-17 to back the agreement.
Part of Florida’s new compact allows the Seminole Tribe to offer online and retail sports betting, with the overall deal being counted on to generate at least US$2.5 billion in new revenue over the next five years for the state.
So, with the political wrangling done in Tallahassee, when can the betting begin? Here are the details about legal sports betting in Florida — for now, anyway.
Ready in time for (some) football?
If the compact as currently constructed passes muster with the federal government, and if it successfully navigates any legal challenges that may arise, sports betting still wouldn't start in Florida until Oct. 15, 2021, which would be right in the thick of the all-important football season.
Under the terms of the deal, bets could be placed on professional and college sports both online and in person at Seminole sportsbooks. Bettors would have to be 21 years of age or older.
The Seminole Tribe is already advertising its Hard Rock Sportsbook app. However, the Seminole must also “contract with any willing, qualified pari-mutuel permitholder,” such as a race track, to carry out "marketing and similar services'' in support of the Tribe’s sportsbooks, a Senate analysis says.
This could involve a pari-mutuel using their brand and providing the consumer-facing part of the business. The bets, though, would ultimately flow to the back-office operations run by the Tribe, which would pay back to the pari-mutuels at least 60 percent of the profits they bring in.
The Seminole would have to strike such arrangements with at least three pari-mutuel permit holders, or the amount of revenue they pay to the state would rise by two percentage points, to 15.75 percent from 13.75 percent.
"The way I explain it to people is there's a skin that is the front-end, which would either be the pari-mutuel and/or the tribe, and on the back-end, it's all linked to the tribal server," Senator Travis Hutson told the chamber's appropriations committee on Monday.
Jim Allen, chief executive of Seminole Gaming, told the committee that there will be opportunities for others such as DraftKings and FanDuel as well, and that some proposals have already been made.
"The Tribe is 100 percent interested and willing to create a business relationship with those companies, whether it be through the pari-mutuels or directly," Allen added.
But first things first…
But before any wagers are placed, Florida’s new gaming compact must be approved by the United States Department of the Interior.
According to an analysis of implementation legislation by House staff, the Secretary of the Interior has 45 days after receiving a proposed compact to make a decision. Any longer than that to approve or disapprove of the deal and it is approved by default.
Under the Indian Gaming and Regulatory Act (IGRA), the Secretary can reject a compact if it violates that federal law. The House staffers also noted that the opinion of the National Indian Gaming Commission is that it is “unclear” if tribes can take bets from people not on their lands, although the online wagers made with the Seminole Tribe will go through their servers.
“Since the status of online sports betting is unclear, legal challenges may arise,” the analysis warns.
'People are going to sue'
The compact could be challenged under state law as well, as an amendment to the Florida constitution that was approved in 2018 now requires a referendum to authorize additional “casino gambling."
No such approval has been given by the voters when it comes to sports betting. And while they still could at some point, legal challenges may be launched in the meantime. No Casinos, a group opposed to further expansion of gambling in the state, has already vowed to continue fighting the deal.
“There are people in this room who say, ‘I don't think this compact’s going to hold up,’” Representative Randy Fine said on Wednesday. “Now, I do. I think the Secretary of the Interior is going to approve the compact. I think the odds of that are very low, but they could. But after that, people are going to sue over the sports-betting provision.”
A blow to retail or mobile sports betting may not necessarily doom the other parts of the gaming compact. Both Rep. Fine and the compact's sponsors in the House pointed to a clause in the deal they say would keep the rest of it alive even if a part is invalidated by the courts.
"If the sports betting goes away, the compact still goes forward, we still get every dollar that we're entitled to based on those revenue-sharing rates for the enormous business that [the Seminole are] operating today," Fine said. "The only difference is we lower the minimum payment a little bit, but we don't change the percentages."
