Online sports betting — albeit in its currently limited legal form — is staying put in Florida for the foreseeable future.
Two gaming firms asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday for more time to officially apply for the justices to review the long-running legal battle over mobile sports betting in the Sunshine State.
West Flagler Associates Ltd. and Bonita-Fort Myers Corp. requested an extension to their deadline to file a petition for a so-called writ of certiorari to Feb. 9, 2024, from its current cutoff of Dec. 11, 2023.
The two companies are arguing that a gaming compact between the state of Florida and its Seminole Tribe overreached federal law by granting the latter control over mobile sports betting across the entire state. A federal judge threw out approval of the compact in 2021, but an appeals court reinstated authorization this past summer.
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The Seminole recently used the current legal cover to relaunch their Hard Rock Bet sportsbook in Florida. Access to the sportsbook is limited to preexisting users and those who join a waitlist.
The West Flagler group is trying to get the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case to try to strike down the deal once more, which would shut down Hard Rock Bet in Florida. The companies argue the compact goes beyond what is permitted by the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA).
At the same time, the firms are pursuing a legal remedy before the Florida Supreme Court regarding state law, including a failed attempt to shut down the recently resumed mobile wagering. In their filing on Monday, the West Flagler group said clarity at the state level could affect their application to the federal Supreme Court.
“Accordingly, since there is a possibility that Applicants’ petition for certiorari could be significantly informed by the decision of the Florida Supreme Court on the State Petition, Applicants respectfully ask this Court to extend the time for Applicants to file such a petition until February 9, 2024, the maximum permitted by Supreme Court Rule 13.5,” they wrote.
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The Supreme Court has yet to decide on Monday’s application. However, the fact it was made at all suggests the current form of online sports betting in Florida could remain in place until at least February and until either the federal or Florida Supreme Court says otherwise. And, unless the Florida gaming firms officially ask for a review, the judges in Washington won’t be shutting down any online sportsbook in the Sunshine State.
It’s clear, however, that the West Flagler group is not abandoning its arguments at the federal level, as it doubled down in its latest filing on its contention that the Seminole gaming compact gives the tribe the right to offer online sports betting statewide, including on non-tribal lands.
“It does so by ‘deeming’ the bets placed from off Indian lands to be treated as if they were placed ‘exclusively’ on the Indian lands of the Tribe,” the companies maintain in their request for an extension. “This fiction was adopted to deem the Compact to be solely dealing with gaming on Indian lands, and thereby to circumvent a Florida constitutional ban on the expansion of casino gaming absent a citizens’ referendum, except for casino gaming covered by a valid IGRA compact for gaming ‘on tribal lands.’"
