In its filing with the Supreme Court, known as an amicus curiae or friend of the court brief, the Justice Department comes down firmly on the side of the tribes. The tribes have argued that they should be allowed to offer forms of gambling that are legal but regulated in Texas. The 5th Circuit has repeatedly ruled that the Restoration Act makes anything other than low-stakes bingo illegal on Tigua or Alabama-Coushatta land. The 1988 law, known as IGRA, allows Indian tribes to regulate gambling on their own land so long as it is not prohibited by federal or state law. The 1987 law, which created a federal trust relationship with the two Texas tribes, included a provision barring the Tigua and Alabama-Coushatta from conducting gambling prohibited in Texas. The legal battle over gambling offered by the Tigua and Alabama-Coushatta has centered on two laws: the Restoration Act of 1987 and the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988. Spokespersons for Abbott and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton haven’t responded to requests for comment. 25 to the high court.īrant Martin, a Fort Worth-based attorney for the Tiguas, said “we are pleased that the solicitor general of the United States has taken the position that it has,” but declined further comment because the case is ongoing. “That error has impaired the uniformity of a federal regulatory scheme, has uniquely disadvantaged two Indian tribes, and has generated repeated litigation and substantial confusion for nearly three decades,” Acting Solicitor General Brian Fletcher and other Justice Department lawyers wrote in a brief submitted Aug. Now, the Biden administration’s Justice Department says those court rulings were wrongly decided and urges the Supreme Court to lift the legal cloud hanging over the tribes. The Texas state government and the tribes have repeatedly gone to court since 1993 over gambling issues, with the state regularly prevailing since a 1994 5th Circuit Court of Appeals decision known as Ysleta I held that federal law prohibited gambling on Tigua (also known as Ysleta del Sur Pueblo) and Alabama-Coushatta land. Justice Department is urging the Supreme Court to reverse decades of court rulings that have said that El Paso’s Tigua tribe and the Alabama-Coushatta of East Texas were illegally offering gambling on their land.

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