Judge Rules Against Florida In Card Game DisputeRacinos Win Victory Over 'Designated-Player' Games In Court Friday |
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An administrative law judge said Friday that Florida’s gambling regulators were wrong to try to put a stop to “designated-player” games, such as Ultimate Texas Hold’em and three-card poker, at the state’s racinos.
Under Florida law, the racinos can’t offer house-banked games, but there was a way around that rule by allowing a player to act as the game’s bank on behalf of the house.
According to a report from the News Service of Florida, Judge E. Gary Early wrote in his decision: “[The Department of Business and Professional Regulation] has taken an activity that it previously found to be legal and authorized and, by repealing the rule and simply being silent on its effect, determined that activity to be prohibited.
“The evidence is conclusive that, by its repeal of [the rule], [the department] simply changed its mind as to whether playing with a designated player constituted the establishment of a prohibited banking game. It previously determined that such games were lawful […] It has now determined they are not."
The games in question generate nearly $90 million in revenue a year for the racinos.
More than two dozen racinos received complaints over the games from Florida in January. The racinos appealed the state’s move to shut them down, and in the meantime they haven’t stopped running them.
The state’s Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering approved the games in 2012, but the politically powerful Seminole Tribe complained about them. Thanks to a compact with Florida, the Seminoles have a monopoly on house-banked table games. Non-banked games (traditional poker) are legal at the racinos and aren’t threatened under the current legal situation.
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