Case: 3:25-cv-00698-wmc Document #: 56-1 Filed: 01/06/26 Page 11 of 13
the consumer (i.e., the bettor) is located. See, e.g. , Jackson , 764 F.3d at 782; Otoe-Missouria , 769 F.3d at 108. Thus, Defendants’ activities occur on Indian lands, regardless of their physical location, because they offer their sports bets to and engage with bettors physically located on Indian lands. B. Defendants’ Sports-Betting Activity is not Authorized in Accordance with IGRA. Further, Defendants’ sports-betting activity is not authorized by either the Compact or the Nation’s tribal gaming ordinance. First, the Compact necessarily prohibits Defendants’ sports betting activities because it authorizes only the Nation to conduct class III gaming on the Nation’s lands, thereby prohibiting all others from doing so. Compact §§ IV.A, VI. The Northern District of California’s differing interpretation of similar, though not identical, compact language in Blue Lake Rancheria v. Kalshi Inc. is not persuasive because the court failed to apply the general rule of contract interpretation that contracts are presumed to be entered with relevant, applicable laws in mind. See Fla. E. Coast Ry. Co. v. CSX Transp., Inc ., 42 F.3d 1125, 1129 (7th Cir. 1994) (“Contracts are presumed to be written in contemplation of the existing applicable law. Specifically, parties are assumed to have contracted with reference to those statutory provisions that relate to the subject matter of their contract.” (citations omitted)). Crucially, as discussed, IGRA provides that class III gaming on Indian lands is illegal unless actively authorized by a compact. 25 U.S.C. § 2710(d)(1)(C). Against this backdrop principle, the Compact’s specific authorization of only the Nation to conduct class III gaming is paramount. Compact § IV.A. Moreover, that Defendants’ conduct is prohibited is only further emphasized by the “application of the rule of expressio unius est exclusio alterius … [which] ‘instructs that when certain matters are mentioned in a contract, other similar matters are not mentioned were intended to be excluded.’” Delta Min. Corp. v. Big Rivers Elec. Corp. , 18 F.3d
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