The lobby of the Mohegan Sun casino's attached hotel. Photo courtesy of Mohegan Sun.
Drivers heading down state roads leading to Foxwoods Resort Casino and Mohegan Sun are greeted by flashing warnings: “Avoid Large Crowds” and “Don’t Gamble With COVID.”
Despite having authority to shutter thousands of businesses during the coronavirus pandemic, Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont has been constrained when dealing with the sovereign tribal nations that own two of the world’s largest casinos. After pleading with tribal leaders to not reopen and even raising the possibility of pulling their state-issued liquor licenses, he ultimately settled for ordering state transportation workers to put up the signs.
“People over the age of 65 should not be in large, congregate settings. We think that’s dangerous, even now,” said Lamont, a Democrat, after the casinos partly reopened on June 1, weeks ahead of the state’s timetable for large indoor events. “So, we tried to put some good, strong advice in place as people are on their way to taking a gamble.”
Connecticut’s two federally recognized tribes, the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and the Mohegan Tribe are not alone in reopening doors early as the nation reemerges from the shutdown – though both say they are being careful about reopening. Facing pressure to bring back employees and start generating revenue, tribes in Washington, Oregon, California, Florida, North Carolina, New York and elsewhere have decided to welcome back gamblers even though their states haven’t allowed large gatherings.
Other businesses have bristled at shutdown orders and restrictions, and some have pushed the limits. But the tribes that run the casinos are different because the U.S. Constitution recognizes them as sovereign nations with full authority within their reservations – so state and local leaders have no say in reopening their casinos.
As of last Tuesday, the American Gaming Association website identified 280 tribal casinos that have so far reopened, while 244 remained closed.
Danielle Her Many Horses, deputy executive director of the National Indian Gaming Association, said those figures represent the diversity of opinion among tribes.
“You have tribes in states that do want to open up and tribes that are like, ’no, no, no, we’re going to back off on this because we don’t think that’s the right idea,’” she said. “And you have others who are like, ‘we need to get our people working,’ who are thinking of it in [terms of] rebooting the economy.”
How tribes have managed the coronavirus pandemic may also reflect their relationship with state and local leaders, Her Many Horses said.
In Connecticut, where the state receives 25 percent of the slot machine revenues generated at Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, Rodney Butler, chairman of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation, said he was surprised Lamont initially took a strong stance against their reopenings. Both tribes repeatedly encouraged the governor to see firsthand the steps they had taken, from installing special air filtration systems to barring busloads of gamblers from New York and Massachusetts.
“I have tribal elders that I’m concerned about. And so I’m not going to put my community at risk,” Butler said. “We’re doing this very, very cautiously and with every safety precaution in mind.”
Ultimately Lamont sent a team of state agency heads to both casinos to review the operations and recommend some changes. Butler, who acknowledges the state’s warning signs are “kind of catchy,” credited Lamont for not caving to pressure to “do things that were a little bit more aggressive” and ultimately recognizing the tribes’ sovereignty.
“I think the adults in the room actually came to the table and had an adult conversation,” Butler added. “He realized that, look, we may agree to disagree and still work well together. And we did.”
