Interior Department affirms view of tribes' third-casino plan
It’s largely a paper war now.
In letters to the chairmen of the Mashantucket Pequot and Mohegan tribes and Connecticut’s attorney general, a U.S. Department of the Interior official affirms the department’s previously stated view that the tribes’ joint ownership of a commercial casino would not affect their existing exclusivity arrangement with the state.
In other words, the department believes the tribes could open a “satellite” casino in East Windsor without jeopardizing agreements that require them to share the slot-machine revenue generated by their respective casinos, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun. In exchange for 25 percent of that revenue, Connecticut grants the tribes the sole right to provide casino gaming in the state.
It’s exactly what the department said in a “technical assistance” letter dated April 25, 2016.
“We confirm that the current Administration supports the views expressed in the technical assistance letter,” James Cason, acting deputy secretary of the Interior Department, writes in a letter released Monday by the tribes.
In a statement, the tribal chairmen hailed the latest letter, which they had promised state lawmakers would be coming, as “major validation for the effort to build a third casino … that will protect Connecticut jobs and revenue.”
Rodney Butler, the Mashantucket chairman, said the letter "provides a huge boost for our project."
The East Windsor casino, if authorized by the state, could help shield Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun from the competitive impact of MGM Springfield, the $950 million resort casino MGM Resorts International is building in Massachusetts.
“This is not news — it’s a hoax,” Uri Clinton, MGM Resorts senior vice president and legal counsel, said in a response. “As the letter itself states, this is not preliminary approval or an advisory opinion. It’s just another attempt by the tribes to pull the wool over people’s eyes, which means the red flags raised by (Connecticut) Attorney General George Jepsen remain as red as ever.”
Jepsen, in a legal opinion issued in March, renewed concerns he had first raised in 2015 about the tribes’ third-casino bid. In the opinion, he said legislation granting the tribes the exclusive right to develop a commercial casino on non-tribal land could trigger a reconsideration of the state’s existing agreements with the tribes. He also cautioned that such legislation could invite legal challenges over its constitutionality.
Jepsen’s office is reviewing the latest Interior letter and had no comment on it, a spokeswoman said.
MGM Resorts representatives sought to counter the letter in advance, distributing a letter among state officials last week that U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., wrote urging that the secretary of the Interior Department refrain from endorsing the tribes’ plans for “off-reservation gaming.”
Referring to the “technical assistance” letter the department provided the tribes last year, McCain, a principal author of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, wrote, “I have grave objections about the previous Administration’s apparent circumvention of over 25 years of Indian gaming law.”
A tribal spokesman took issue with McCain’s letter, pointing out that the senator mistakenly indicated the tribes were trying to open a casino “near the Connecticut-New York border just a few miles from New York City.”
MGM has commissioned research that found that a casino in southwestern Connecticut would benefit the state more than one north of Hartford, the region the tribes targeted, ultimately settling on the site of a former Showcase Cinemas building off Interstate 91 in East Windsor.
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