Case: 1:25-cv-15406 Document #: 43-1 Filed: 01/30/26 Page 3 of 17 PageID #:369
U.S.C. § 2702(1). IGRA has been incredibly successful on that front. 2 Since IGRA’s passage in 1988, tribes across the United States have lifted entire generations out of poverty through tribal gaming. Gaming revenue supports thousands of jobs in hundreds of communities, and provides critical funding to tribal, state, and local governments through revenue-sharing agreements, taxes, and economic stimulus. See Michigan v. Bay Mills Indian Cmty. , 572 U.S. 782, 810 (2014) (Sotomayor, J., concurring) (“[T]ribal gaming operations cannot be understood as mere profit-making ventures that are wholly separate from the Tribes’ core governmental functions.”). For tribes, gaming is not a “commercial” endeavor but an existential one. Tribes have primary jurisdiction over their lands and activities occurring thereon. Tribes, like states, also have a strong sovereign interest in determining what gaming activities may take place on their lands. Thus, tribal jurisdiction extends to gaming, which has long been recognized by Congress and the Supreme Court. See California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians , 480 U.S. 202, 218–22 (1987); 25 U.S.C. § 2701(5). In 1988, Congress enacted IGRA “to provide a statutory basis for the regulation of gaming by an Indian tribe … to ensure that the Indian tribe is the primary beneficiary of the gaming operation, and to ensure that gaming is conducted fairly and honestly by both the operators and players.” 25 U.S.C. § 2702(2). Coinbase asks this court to subvert this longstanding and comprehensive regulatory regime. The consequences of Coinbase’s arguments are difficult to overstate. Its reading of the Commodity Exchange Act (“CEA”) would amount to a sub silentio reversal of congressional policy and Supreme court precedent; eviscerate existing tribal-state gaming compacts and
2 See, e.g. , National Indian Gaming Commission, FY 2023 Gross Gaming Revenue Report 4–5 (Jul. 2024), available at https://www.nigc.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/GGR23_Final.pdf.
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