WEEKLY ROUNDUP
Weekly Roundup: Another triumph for the tribe
The Seminole Tribe of Florida scored another legal win this week when a federal appeals court turned down a request for a rehearing in a case that gave the tribe control over sports betting throughout the state.
The request came from pari-mutuels Magic City Casino in Miami-Dade County and Bonita Springs Poker Room in Southwest Florida, who challenged the multi-billion dollar sports-betting plan. Owners of the pari-mutuels asked for what is known as “en banc,” or full court, hearing. But the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rejected the request Monday without a detailed explanation.
Monday’s ruling came after a three-judge panel of the court in June reversed a November 2021 decision by a federal judge who halted the agreement. U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich ruled that the plan ran afoul of the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, which regulates gambling on tribal lands, because the deal would allow gambling off property owned by the Seminoles.
The 30-year gambling deal, signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis and Seminole Tribe of Florida Chairman Marcellus Osceola in 2021, included a “hub-and-spoke” sports-betting plan designed to allow gamblers anywhere in the state to place bets online.
The three-judge panel of the appeals court, however, ruled unanimously in June that the Washington, D.C.-based district judge erred when she found that the compact violated the federal law because it authorized gambling “both on and off” Indian lands.
The impact of Monday’s ruling on sports betting in Florida was not immediately clear. Gary Bitner, a spokesman for the Seminoles, said Tuesday the tribe was “pleased” with the appeals court’s decision not to grant the en banc hearing. But the Seminoles did not comment on whether they planned to start accepting bets again on a mobile app that was put on hold amid the legal wrangling.
The pari-mutuels “are weighing all options, including a possible petition seeking the (U.S.) Supreme Court’s review,” Hamish Hume, a lawyer with the Boies Schiller Flexner LLP firm who represents them, said in a statement this week.
Daniel Wallach, an attorney who specializes in gambling law, told The News Service of Florida Tuesday that the ruling in the Florida case “is in conflict with at least eight federal appeals court decisions from other circuits declaring that” the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act “has no application to off-reservation tribal gaming activities.”
Wallach added that the U.S. Supreme Court will need to resolve the issue “sooner or later.”
A LOOK AT
EXPANSION
The growth of Florida’s school voucher programs following a major expansion of the programs started coming into focus this week.
Data published Wednesday showed that nearly 123,000 new students have received vouchers after state lawmakers approved the expansion during this year’s legislative session.
As of Sept. 8, 242,929 students had enrolled in 2,098 private schools using vouchers through the state’s two main programs, the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship and Family Empowerment Scholarship, according to a report by Step Up for Students, an organization that administers the vast majority of vouchers in the state.
That is an increase from the roughly 170,000 students who received vouchers through the programs during the 2022-2023 school year.
Of the nearly 243,000 students this year, 122,895 “are new to the programs,” though many had already been enrolled in private schools, according to Step Up for Students.
“Of the 122,895 new students, 84,505 (69%) were already in private school, 16,096 (13%) came from public schools, and 22,294 are entering kindergartners,” the report released Wednesday said. “Does 16,096 represent an ‘exodus’ from the public schools as critics forecast HB 1 (the bill that included the expansion) would cause?”
The Florida Policy Institute, a non-profit that has opposed the major voucher expansion, raised concerns about other parts of the data released this week.
“As we continue to analyze the data provided by Step-Up For Students, what initially stands out is that roughly 7 in 10 new scholarship awards are going to students already enrolled in private school, at what FPI (Florida Policy Institute) estimates is a $676 million cost to the state,” the Florida Policy Institute, which strenuously opposed the voucher expansion, said in a statement Thursday.
The information released this week also addressed other questions about the expansion, which in part eliminated income eligibility requirements for receiving vouchers.
The report said that 27 percent of the voucher students enrolled this year in private schools are from households with incomes above $120,000 — which is 400 percent of the federal poverty level for families of four — or from families who “did not submit income information.” About 29 percent are from families whose incomes are between 185 percent and 400 percent of poverty level, which would include household incomes of up to $120,000 for families of four. Another 44 percent are from families below 185 percent of the federal poverty level, or $55,000 in income for a family of four.
The expanded voucher programs also now allow families of homeschooled students to receive the scholarships.
The law created what is known as the Personalized Education Program, which the state Department of Education’s website said was “created to serve Florida’s home education population who would like access to an education saving account to fund their student’s learning.”
According to Step Up for Students, 15,097 homeschooled students have enrolled in the new program.
BOOSTER-BASHING
Continuing a long-running clash with federal health officials, the DeSantis administration on Wednesday recommended that people under age 65 not receive newly approved Covid-19 booster shots.
State Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo issued guidance that was dramatically different from a recommendation Tuesday by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which said people 6 months old and older should receive updated Covid-19 vaccines. The CDC recommendation came a day after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved use of vaccines that it said are “formulated to more closely target currently circulating variants.”
The Florida Department of Health guidance, however, said “the most recent booster approval was granted in the absence of any meaningful booster-specific clinical trial data performed in humans.” It also contended that the “federal government has failed to provide sufficient data to support the safety and efficacy of the Covid-19 vaccines.”
STORY OF THE WEEK: Dealing another victory to the Seminole Tribe of Florida, a federal appeals court has denied a request from pari-mutuel owners for a rehearing after a ruling that upheld a multibillion-dollar deal giving the tribe control over sports betting throughout the state.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “That doesn’t mean we’re out of the water … We want everybody to be very vigilant about stopping those mosquito bites.” — Sarasota County Mosquito Control District Director Wade Brennan, after a mosquito-borne illness alert for malaria in Sarasota and Manatee counties was lifted this week.