Oklahoma Tribe Hopes to Get Green Light for Poker Website

Iowa Tribe hopes to be allowed to launch PokerTribe.com gambling website (Image: CalvinAyre.com).

Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma has revealed ambitious plans to create an online gambling website that would cater for international players, and they now await a ruling on their proposal.

The tribe chairman Bobby Walkup has issued a press release, revealing that they had asked a US District Court Judge in Oklahoma City to certify a November decision and thus allow them to launch a gambling side PokerTribe.com.

Retired Oklahoma Criminal Court of Appeal Judge Charles Chapel issued a decision on November 24 that an online gambling site targeting international players was in line with the Oklahoma Tribal-State Gaming Compact, and as such, did not violate any state of federal laws.

The Iowa Tribe representatives now hope that a US District Court Judge will certify said ruling, in which case they would be able to take the gaming site live.

Two Tribes Earlier Banned from Launching Gaming Website

However, it is important to note that this is by no means a given considering that the federal Department of the Interior (DOI) spoiled the plans of Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes to launch an online gambling website back in 2013.

The DOI found that such website did not comply with the existing contract between the tribes and the state and as such violated the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act.

The two tribes attempted to challenge the ruling in court, but were eventually forced to drop the suit in 2014 as the new leadership decided they wanted nothing to do with the much criticised online website.

Iowa Tribe’s site PokerTribe.com has been designed to start as an online poker room, before also offering slots, blackjack, baccarat, bingo and pull tabs (scratch cards).

The Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes offered a very good deal to the state as Oklahoma were in line to receive 20% of the online website’s revenue, although many believed that such an arrangement would seriously hurt the tribes’ chances of turning a profit in the long run.

Meanwhile, the state’s revenue from the proposed Iowa Tribe website would depend on the volume of traffic, but the general consensus is that both the state and the operators would struggle to break even.