IGRA and Tribal Gaming: Compacts, Class III Blackjack and the Maine and Connecticut Exceptions
Two tribal casinos under the same federal statute can deal very different card games, and the reason is the class the game falls into, not house policy.
The short answer
- The statute: the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, Pub. L. 100-497, codified at 25 U.S.C. 2701 and following, signed Oct. 17, 1988.
- Why it exists: California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, 480 U.S. 202, decided Feb. 25, 1987, left reservations in permissive states as gaming jurisdictions with no state role.
- Blackjack’s class: Class III. The statute names blackjack (21) by number as a banking card game Class II cannot hold.
- What Class III takes: an approved tribal gaming ordinance, a state that permits the gaming for some purpose, and a compact in effect carrying the Secretary of the Interior’s approval. A tribe cannot simply decide to deal it.
- Online: Connecticut is the only state with tribal online casino gaming live. Maine authorized a tribes-only model on Jan. 11, 2026 and has not launched it.
Cabazon and the Line Between Regulating and Prohibiting
Congress did not write the tribal gaming statute on its own initiative. The Supreme Court forced the question 19 months earlier.
Two tribal casinos in different states, under the same federal statute, can offer very different card games: one deals six-deck shoe blackjack against the house, the other a game that looks like blackjack but is banked by the players for a per-hand fee. Readers who bring that question to legal blackjack sites usually assume house policy. It is the class the game falls into, and whether the tribe holds a federally approved agreement with its state. For the wider federal picture see the federal gambling statutes hub; for the state view, the state index.
Congress acted only after the Supreme Court forced it. On Feb. 25, 1987, in California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, 480 U.S. 202, a 6-3 majority written by Justice Byron White held that California and Riverside County could not enforce their gambling statutes against high-stakes bingo and a card club run by the Cabazon and Morongo Bands on reservation land.
The reasoning still governs. Public Law 280, a 1953 statute, handed California criminal jurisdiction in Indian country, and the Court read that grant narrowly. California ran a lottery, licensed horse wagering, allowed card rooms and authorized charitable bingo, so its bingo statute was regulatory.
The Public Law 280 test, in one line each
A law forbidding conduct outright is criminal and prohibitory, and it is enforceable on the reservation. A law permitting conduct subject to conditions is civil and regulatory, and it stops at the reservation line.
Reservations in permissive states became gaming jurisdictions with no state role. Nineteen months later, on Oct. 17, 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, Pub. L. 100-497, codified at 25 U.S.C. 2701 and following. Cabazon survived inside it: Class III gaming is lawful only where the tribe sits in “a State that permits such gaming for any purpose by any person, organization, or entity.”
Three Classes of Gaming, and Why Blackjack Is Class III
The scheme in 25 U.S.C. 2703 decides what a tribal casino can put on its floor, and it names blackjack directly.
The scheme in 25 U.S.C. 2703 decides what a casino can put on its floor.
Class I, at 2703(6)
Social games for prizes of minimal value and traditional gaming tied to tribal ceremonies. The tribe regulates it alone, and it never reaches a casino floor.
Class II, at 2703(7)
Bingo including electronic aids, pull-tabs and instant bingo, plus non-banked card games the state authorizes or does not prohibit. Raked poker is the standard example. The exclusion clause is what matters: Class II does not include “any banking card games, including baccarat, chemin de fer, or blackjack (21), or electronic or electromechanical facsimiles of any game of chance or slot machines of any kind.” Blackjack is named in the statute, by number, as a game Class II cannot hold.
Class III, at 2703(8)
Defined by subtraction: everything that is not Class I or Class II. Slots, roulette, craps, baccarat, keno, sports wagering and blackjack dealt against the house. The federal regulator’s game classification opinions return variants such as K 21 Blackjack and Apache 21 as Class III.
One question decides it: does the operation win when you lose?
If so, the game is Class III and needs a compact. A Class II hall can run hundreds of bingo-based machines and still not deal 21.
A grandfather clause preserves Class II status, at old limits, for card games a tribe legally ran for two years before May 1, 1988 in Michigan, North Dakota, South Dakota, Washington and Wisconsin.
The other three federal statutes, read the same way
IGRA is one of four federal laws that get quoted in arguments about American online blackjack. Each of the others has its own page here.
Tribal-State Compacts: What They Cover and How They Get Approved
A compact is a negotiated agreement between sovereigns, closer to a treaty than a license application, and it fixes what a card player notices.
Section 2710(d) imposes three conditions: an approved tribal gaming ordinance, a state that permits the gaming for some purpose, and a compact in effect.
Subsection (d)(3)(C) lists the permitted subjects:
- Criminal and civil laws related to licensing and regulation.
- Allocation of jurisdiction between the tribe and the state.
- State assessments covering actual regulatory cost.
- Tribal taxation.
- Breach-of-contract remedies.
- Operating and facility standards.
- A catch-all for “any other subjects that are directly related to the operation of gaming activities.”
A modern compact runs 60 to 150 pages and fixes what a card player notices: authorized games, table limits, internal controls, surveillance and patron dispute procedures.
Revenue sharing and exclusivity
Revenue sharing rides on that catch-all, awkwardly, since subsection (d)(4) bars a state from taxing tribal gaming. The workaround is exchange: the state gives something it was not obliged to give, usually exclusivity, and the tribe pays a percentage for it. That is worth holding on to, because tribal exclusivity is not obstruction. Those compacts were bargained for.
Interior codified the test in 2024. Under 25 C.F.R. 293.27, revenue sharing is allowed only “in exchange for a State’s meaningful concessions resulting in a substantial economic benefit for the Tribe.” The department applies “great scrutiny,” presumes payments beyond regulatory cost are prohibited, and requires proof the tribe remains “the primary beneficiary of the gaming.”
Rates vary with the concession. Oklahoma’s model compact, at 3A O.S. 281, sets them out in bands.
| What is taxed | Rate owed to Oklahoma |
|---|---|
| Electronic games, first $10 million of adjusted gross revenue | 4 percent |
| Electronic games, next $10 million | 5 percent |
| Electronic games, above $20 million | 6 percent |
| Monthly net winnings from card game pools | 10 percent |
| Annual oversight assessment | $35,000 |
The 45-day clock at Interior
Signatures do not make a compact effective. It goes to the Secretary of the Interior, who may approve or disapprove it on three narrow grounds, and it takes effect when notice runs in the Federal Register.
The sovereigns sign
A tribe and a state conclude a negotiated compact. Signing alone changes nothing about what may be dealt.
Submission to Interior
The compact goes to the Secretary of the Interior, who may approve or disapprove it on three narrow grounds.
The 45-day clock runs
Subsection (d)(8)(C): “If the Secretary does not approve or disapprove a compact described in subparagraph (A) before the date that is 45 days after the date on which the compact is submitted to the Secretary for approval, the compact shall be considered to have been approved by the Secretary,” to the extent it is consistent with the act.
Notice in the Federal Register
The compact takes effect when the notice publishes. Only then may the Class III games it authorizes be dealt.
Silence is consent, with an asterisk. Interior let that clock run out on the Seminole compact in 2021 rather than sign it, and the notice published Aug. 11, 2021 was titled Approval by Operation of Law.
What the National Indian Gaming Commission Regulates, and What It Does Not
The commission is the primary regulator for Class II. For the shoe game on a Class III floor, it is not the authority most players assume.
Section 2704 created a three-member federal gaming agency: a chair nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate, plus two associate commissioners appointed by the Secretary. It reported $46.2 billion in gross gaming revenue for fiscal 2025 on July 21, 2026, up 5.3 percent, across 545 operations run by 246 tribes in 29 states.
What the commission does
- Approves tribal gaming ordinances.
- Approves management contracts under 2711.
- Runs background checks and audits.
- Issues civil fines and closure orders.
- Acts as the primary regulator for Class II.
What it does not do
- It does not regulate how Class III games are dealt.
- It cannot write or enforce minimum internal control standards for Class III, per Colorado River Indian Tribes v. National Indian Gaming Commission, 466 F.3d 134, decided by the D.C. Circuit in 2006.
- Congress assigned that job to tribes and states through compacts.
- The Class III portions of 25 C.F.R. Part 542 have been suspended since, and those standards are now non-binding guidance.
A disputed shoe game at a tribal property is therefore rarely a federal matter. The compact governs and normally names a tribal gaming commission as the forum, unlike the commercial states, where the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement and its peers take complaints directly. Our guide to filing a complaint covers which door to knock on.
If the dispute is at a tribal property, know the forum first
Tribal gaming commissions, not state regulators, hear most Class III disputes. These pages cover the process and the state agencies that do take complaints directly.
Seminole Tribe v. Florida and the Remedy That Vanished
Congress built an enforcement escalator into the statute in 1988. The Supreme Court removed its bottom step in 1996, and talks have stalled for years since.
Congress built an escalator into 2710(d)(7). A tribe whose state refused to negotiate, or negotiated in bad faith, could sue in federal court; a bad-faith finding triggered a 60-day order to conclude a compact, then a mediator choosing between the parties’ best offers, then Secretarial procedures if the state still balked.
On March 27, 1996, the Supreme Court removed the bottom step. Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida, 517 U.S. 44, held 5-4, per Chief Justice William Rehnquist, that the Eleventh Amendment bars Congress from authorizing tribes to sue unconsenting states in federal court. Congress had plainly meant to abrogate immunity, but lacked the power to do so under the Indian Commerce Clause. The decision overruled Pennsylvania v. Union Gas Co. and closed the side door too, holding that the detailed scheme in (d)(7) precluded an Ex parte Young suit against the state officer.
The good-faith duty survives; the automatic remedy does not
The duty to negotiate in good faith has since had no automatic enforcement against a state that pleads immunity, which is why talks can stall for years.
Secretarial procedures: Interior’s partial fix
Interior answered in 1999 with 25 C.F.R. Part 291, procedures the Secretary could prescribe when a state asserted immunity. In Texas v. United States, 497 F.3d 491 (5th Cir. 2007), the Fifth Circuit struck Part 291 down as too far adrift from congressional intent because it dispensed with the judicial bad-faith finding the statute makes the trigger; the Tenth Circuit reached a similar result. Elsewhere the procedures stand. Interior then overhauled compact review in a final rule published Feb. 21, 2024 and effective March 22, 2024, producing the current 25 C.F.R. Part 293.
The Internet Problem: Where Does a Wager Happen?
Everything above assumes a building on Indian lands. A player on a couch 90 miles away breaks that assumption, and only one jurisdiction has tested the answer to the end.
All of the above assumes a building on Indian lands, and online play breaks that assumption. A player on a couch 90 miles from the reservation is not on Indian lands; the server taking the bet might be. The hub-and-spoke theory says the wager occurs where the server sits, so the compact covers it. The objection is that it proves too much. In the one jurisdiction tested to the end, state law did the work.
Florida’s answer and the litigation it drew
Florida and the Seminole Tribe signed a compact April 23, 2021, amended May 17, and the Legislature ratified it in special session. The deeming language sits in Florida statute rather than only in the compact, at section 285.710: wagers on sports betting, “including wagers made by players physically located within the state using a mobile or other electronic device, shall be deemed to be exclusively conducted by the Tribe where the servers or other devices used to conduct such wagering activity on the Tribe’s Indian lands are located.”
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| April 23, 2021 | Florida and the Seminole Tribe sign a compact, amended May 17; the Legislature ratifies it in special session. |
| Aug. 11, 2021 | Interior lets the 45 days lapse and the compact takes effect by operation of law. |
| Nov. 22, 2021 | Pari-mutuel operators having sued, Judge Dabney Friedrich vacates the approval, finding it authorized gaming off Indian lands. |
| June 30, 2023 | The D.C. Circuit reverses on a narrower theory: a compact is a contract between sovereigns that may discuss off-reservation activity, and the authority for that piece comes from Florida law rather than the compact, so the Secretary’s approval was not unlawful. |
| Sept. 11, 2023 | Rehearing denied. |
| Oct. 25, 2023 | A stay is denied. |
| June 17, 2024 | Certiorari denied. |
| 2024 | A state-court challenge fails at the Florida Supreme Court because the petition was the wrong vehicle, and the tribe settles with the lead plaintiff. |
Two limits matter before anyone reads this as a green light
The tested product is sports wagering, not online table games, and the win turned on procedure and on Florida’s own statute rather than a federal blessing for internet casino play. Durable in Florida, weak precedent anywhere else.
Interior writes the server rule into regulation
The 2024 rulemaking put the theory into regulation. Section 293.26 lets a compact address statewide remote wagering and allocate jurisdiction over wagering that starts off Indian lands, on three conditions:
- State law and the compact both designate the gaming as occurring on the tribe’s Indian lands where the server accepting the wagers is located.
- The tribe regulates the gaming.
- The player is not on another tribe’s Indian lands without its consent.
Read the first condition closely: Interior requires state law to say so. The rule does not let a tribe impose statewide internet gaming on an unwilling state; it tells a willing state how to build it.
Where you are sitting is the whole question
The server rule turns on player location, and so does every licensed US casino account. These pages explain how that gets enforced against you.
Connecticut: Online Casino Built Through the Compacts, Not Around Them
Connecticut amended its existing tribal agreements rather than routing around its tribes, which is exactly why it has two online casinos and no more.
Every other regulated online casino state layered internet gaming on commercial licensing: New Jersey tied internet permits to Atlantic City licensees, and Michigan made tribes state-licensed internet operators alongside the Detroit casinos.
Connecticut could not. Its two gaming tribes, the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and the Mohegan Tribe, held casino exclusivity the Legislature could not legislate away. The Mashantucket Pequot position traces to a good-faith suit the tribe won in the Second Circuit on Sept. 4, 1990, Mashantucket Pequot Tribe v. Connecticut, 913 F.2d 1024: because the state permitted charitable “Las Vegas nights” featuring casino games, those games were permitted for some purpose there, and the tribe could negotiate for them. Foxwoods opened in 1992; the Mohegan compact followed in 1994.
So the 2021 expansion went through the compacts. House Bill 6451, enacted as Public Act 21-23 and signed by Gov. Ned Lamont on May 27, 2021, was drafted alongside amendments to both tribal agreements and their memoranda of understanding, conditioned on federal approval. Interior approved the Mohegan amendment Sept. 15, 2021, and the Federal Register notice records that the amendment, the memorandum and the state act “work in unison” to give the two tribes exclusivity for online casino gaming, two of three off-reservation sports wagering licenses, and on-reservation online play. The compact record at Indian Affairs carries the same date.
| Master wagering licensee | Status | What it may offer |
|---|---|---|
| Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation | Tribal | Online casino gaming, which in Connecticut includes online blackjack and live dealer tables, plus off-reservation sports wagering and on-reservation online play. |
| Mohegan Tribe | Tribal | Online casino gaming, which in Connecticut includes online blackjack and live dealer tables, plus off-reservation sports wagering and on-reservation online play. |
| Connecticut Lottery Corporation | State | Sports wagering only. No online casino gaming and no blackjack. |
Commercial operators appear only as the tribes’ platform partners, never as licensees in their own right, while consumer regulation runs through the Department of Consumer Protection. Play went live in October 2021, and the state publishes monthly revenue.
Why a Connecticut player sees two brands and thin promotions
A Connecticut account sits with a tribal licensee, not a state-licensed casino company, and the market is capped at two brands, which is why promotional competition looks thin. Compare our blackjack bonus breakdown.
Maine: A Settlement Act That Rewrote the Rules
Maine is the one state where the federal tribal gaming statute barely applies at all, and a 1996 First Circuit decision is the reason.
In Maine the compact system barely applies. The Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act of 1980, Pub. L. 96-420, codified at 25 U.S.C. 1721 through 1735, resolved vast land claims by the Passamaquoddy Tribe and the Penobscot Nation and, in exchange, subjected them to state law to a degree with no parallel elsewhere. It ratified a companion state statute, the Maine Implementing Act at 30 M.R.S. 6201 and following, which treats the tribes for many purposes like Maine municipalities. Section 1735(b) is the hinge: a later federal law enacted for the benefit of Indians generally does not apply within Maine if it would affect the settlement’s allocation of jurisdiction, unless Congress specifically makes it applicable there.
The tribal gaming statute says nothing about Maine. In Passamaquoddy Tribe v. Maine, 75 F.3d 784 (1st Cir. 1996), the First Circuit held the savings clause survived, calling it a warning to later Congresses to “stop, look, and listen,” and found Congress had not made the gaming act applicable in Maine. The Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians falls under the same settlement; the Mi’kmaq Nation was recognized separately in 1991 under its own settlement act.
So Maine’s four federally recognized tribes cannot compel the state to negotiate, invoke the good-faith remedy, or open a Class III casino by the route available in New Mexico or California. Whatever they get comes from the Legislature.
Sports betting first, in 2022
Maine’s answer was a statutory monopoly, not a compact. LD 585, enacted as Public Law 2021, chapter 681 on May 2, 2022, was titled “An Act To Enhance Tribal-State Collaboration … and To Authorize Casinos, Off-track Betting Facilities, Federally Recognized Indian Tribes and Certain Commercial Tracks To Conduct Sports Wagering.”
The mobile piece went to the tribes alone. 8 M.R.S. 1207 restricts mobile sports wagering licenses to federally recognized Indian tribes in the state, one per tribe, transferable only to a wholly owned tribal entity. The fee fell from $200,000 to $50,000 for licenses issued on or after Sept. 1, 2024. The state takes 10 percent of adjusted gross sports wagering receipts under 8 M.R.S. 1218, split among the general fund, the Gambling Addiction Prevention and Treatment Fund, harness racing and agricultural fairs. Mobile betting launched in November 2023.
The 2025 internet gaming law and where it stands
Maine extended the design to casino games. LD 1164, “An Act to Create Economic Opportunity for the Wabanaki Nations Through Internet Gaming,” cleared the Legislature in June 2025 as amended by Committee Amendment C-A, H-393. Gov. Janet Mills announced Jan. 8, 2026 that she would let it become law unsigned, citing concerns about gambling’s public health effects but a preference for regulating the new form. It was enacted without her signature Jan. 11, 2026 as chapter 538.
Each of the four Wabanaki Nations, the Passamaquoddy Tribe, the Penobscot Nation, the Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians and the Mi’kmaq Nation, may hold one internet gaming license and contract with a single commercial platform: four skins statewide, and no path for the commercial casinos at Oxford and Bangor. Reported terms put the state’s share at 16 percent, directed to gambling addiction services, substance use treatment, emergency housing and veteran housing. The definition is unusually direct for a card player: the Gambling Control Unit states that internet gaming means a card game, dice game or other approved game of chance, “including but not limited to blackjack, poker, dice, craps, roulette or baccarat,” offered through an approved mobile application or digital platform.
Status in late August 2026: legal, but not live
Rulemaking is unfinished, no license has been issued, and no site is accepting Maine players; officials point to late 2026 or early 2027. In January 2026 the owners of Oxford Casino sued the state’s gambling director in federal court, calling the tribes-only licensing a race-based classification that fails equal protection and burdens interstate commerce. The tribes answer that the classification is political rather than racial, the standard position since Morton v. Mancari, 417 U.S. 535 (1974). Treat launch dates as provisional and check the legislation tracker. Anything marketed as a Maine online casino today is offshore; our comparison of offshore and licensed sites explains the tradeoff.
Follow the two states where tribal law decides your account
Connecticut is live and capped at two brands. Maine is authorized and waiting on rulemaking. These pages track both.
Compact States and House-Banked Blackjack
These are states where tribal compacts, not commercial licensing, are the main authority for casino gaming.
Terms change when compacts are renegotiated, so treat this as orientation.
| State | Class III authority | House-banked blackjack | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Arizona | Compacts, amended 2021 | Yes | 2021 amendments added craps and roulette |
| California | Compacts under Cal. Const. art. IV, sec. 19(f) | Yes | Proposition 1A, 2000, authorized banking card games |
| Connecticut | Pequot procedures 1991, Mohegan compact 1994, amended 2021 | Yes | Same two tribes hold online casino exclusivity |
| Florida | 2021 compact, effective by operation of law | Yes | Runs to 2051; Seminole properties only |
| Maine | No compacts; state statute only | No tribal casino floors | Settlement act keeps the federal gaming statute out |
| Michigan | Compacts of 1993 and 1998 | Yes | Tribes also hold state internet gaming licenses |
| Minnesota | Compacts of 1989 and 1991 | Yes | Blackjack and video games of chance only |
| New Mexico | Compacts, current term signed 2015 | Yes | Revenue sharing scales with gaming revenue |
| New York | Compacts with Seneca, Oneida and St. Regis Mohawk nations | Yes | Commercial licensing runs in parallel |
| North Dakota | Compacts enforced by the attorney general | Yes | Charitable blackjack also licensed off reservation |
| Oklahoma | Model compact, 3A O.S. 281, plus 2018 supplements | No | Covered games reach only nonhouse-banked card games |
| Washington | Compacts with all 29 federally recognized tribes | Yes | Commission publishes approved table game rules |
| Wisconsin | Compacts of 1991 and 1992, since amended | Yes | One of five states with the pre-1988 carve-out |
| Wyoming | Compact with the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho | Yes | Wind River is the state’s only casino gaming |
Oklahoma is the outlier. It has more tribal gaming operations than any other state, and many tables are labeled blackjack, but the model compact reaches only “nonhouse-banked card games,” meaning the tribe has no interest in the outcome and all bets go into a common pool from which winnings are paid. The 2018 supplements authorized by 3A O.S. 280.1 added craps and roulette variants on the same condition.
House-banked blackjack, as in Washington or North Dakota
- The operation is your opponent and wins when you lose.
- That makes it Class III, so a compact approved by the Secretary of the Interior is in force.
- A basic strategy chart for a six-deck shoe prices the game correctly.
Nonhouse-banked card games, as in Oklahoma
- The tribe has no interest in the outcome. All bets go into a common pool from which winnings are paid.
- The house takes a per-hand fee instead of your losses.
- A basic strategy chart for a house-banked six-deck shoe will not price the commission. That is a checkable difference from Washington or North Dakota.
What Any of This Means at the Table
Four things a player can read off a tribal casino floor, or off a state’s online casino market, without asking anyone.
Banked against the house means a compact is in force
Blackjack dealt against the house means a compact is in force. A fee-based card game instead means the compact does not cover banked games.
A floor of bingo machines is a signal
Class II bingo-based machines are not slot machines, whatever the cabinet looks like; a floor full of them signals no Class III compact.
Tribal online casino gaming exists in one state
It exists in Connecticut today, because the state built it through the compacts. Maine authorized a different model and has not launched it.
Disputes go to a tribal forum, not a state regulator
They run through the tribal forums named in the compact, not a state regulator such as the Maine Gambling Control Unit. Our page on whether online blackjack is legal in the US sets the wider frame.
If gambling has stopped being entertainment, help is free and confidential
A free, confidential counselor answers 1-800-697-3738 at any time of day or night. State programs and self-exclusion options are on our responsible gambling hub.
Where to read next
IGRA decides what a tribal casino may deal. These pages cover the rest of the picture, from the wider legal frame to what a fair game looks like.
Reviewed and brought current on Aug. 25, 2026. Compacts, rulemaking dockets and litigation all move, and the Maine launch timetable in particular is worth re-checking. This page describes the law as we read it and is no substitute for a lawyer in your state.
