The Supreme Court agreed this morning to wade into a long-running dispute between Texas and two Native American tribes over the tribes’ right to run gaming operations on their tribal land in the state.

If the two Texas tribes were to win their case in the Supreme Court, there could be a ripple effect across the nation, spurring more tribe-controlled casinos.

In the unsigned order Oct. 18 in Ysleta Del Sur Pueblo v. State of Texas, court file 20-493, the justices, as is their custom, offered no explanation for their decision.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit ruled against the tribes, finding that the state was within its legal rights to bar gaming startups by the tribes. Gaming is an industry euphemism for gambling.

The Biden administration is siding with the two Texas tribes, arguing that they don’t have the same gaming rights that many other tribes around the nation already enjoy.

Texas, which generally opposes gambling, argued in court documents last month that the appeals court made the correct decision and urged the Supreme Court to decline the case.

The law governing Native American tribes in the United States is complex.

The federal government and Indian tribes have a special relationship. As the Supreme Court found in U.S. v. Mitchell (1983), “a general trust relationship between the United States and the Indian people” has long existed. That the U.S. government has a duty to honor its treaty commitments is called the doctrine of trust responsibility.

The trust responsibility between the two tribes and the federal government had been terminated by Congress by the 1960s. A federal statute from 1986 restored the federal trust responsibility, along with the sovereign status and the lands of the two tribes, but contained provisions preventing the tribes from getting involved in the gaming business.

In 1988, Congress approved a separate statute, the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA), which created a regulatory framework securing a tribe’s right to offer certain gaming activities on its sovereign land if those activities are otherwise legal in the state where they take place.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Texas, holding that bingo games at Speaking Rock Entertainment Center in El Paso were unlawful and that the applicable gaming rights were governed by the 1986 law, not IGRA.

This is a developing story. It will be updated.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/supreme-court-agrees-to-hear-indian-gambling-dispute-from-texas_4053984.html