{"id":388038,"date":"2026-07-06T16:38:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T16:38:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/388038\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T16:38:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T16:38:15","slug":"judge-rejects-california-tribes-latest-attempt-to-kill-blackjack-at-cardrooms-lost-coast-outpost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/388038\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge Rejects California Tribes\u2019 Latest Attempt to Kill Blackjack at Cardrooms | Lost Coast Outpost"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Protesters gather outside the Sheraton Grand Sacramento Hotel in Sacramento on May 21, 2026 to oppose regulations that would end black jack-style games at cardrooms across the state. The state\u2019s cardroom industry recently sued Attorney General Rob Bonta to block the regulations. Bonta was speaking at a CalMatters-sponsored event at the hotel. Photo by Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters<\/p>\n

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This story was originally published by CalMatters<\/a>. Sign up<\/a> for their newsletters.<\/p>\n

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California\u2019s dozens of private gambling halls can continue offering blackjack and other table games after a San Francisco judge ruled last week that Attorney General Rob Bonta overstepped when he tried to ban them.<\/p>\n

San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard Darwin ruled that Bonta\u2019s Bureau of Gambling Control didn\u2019t have the legal authority<\/a> to issue statewide rules severely restricting the games at cardrooms.<\/p>\n

The ruling, which followed Darwin\u2019s temporary order in May<\/a>, is the latest defeat for the state\u2019s casino-owning Native American tribes. They have spent years and tens of millions of dollars unsuccessfully appealing to courts<\/a>, voters<\/a>, the Legislature<\/a> and California regulators to put their only in-state competitors out of the blackjack business.<\/p>\n

The tribes contend cardrooms have unscrupulously violated state laws prohibiting anyone but tribal casinos from offering \u201chouse-banked,\u201d Las Vegas-style table games including blackjack, the most lucrative. <\/p>\n

Cardroom operators say the ruling once again proves their business model is legal. It also ensures taxes that cities receive from blackjack revenues will continue to support local government services and cardroom jobs.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor more than a year, we have said this case is about far more than gaming \u2014 it is about whether the attorney general and his regulators can bypass the Legislature and unilaterally rewrite decades of established law,\u201d Kyle Kirkland, a Fresno cardroom owner and president of the California Gaming Association, said in a statement. \u201cThe court delivered a clear answer: they cannot.\u201d<\/p>\n

James May, a spokesperson for California Nations Indian Gaming Association, didn\u2019t return an interview request.<\/p>\n

Bonta\u2019s office said in an email that officials were disappointed in the ruling and are reviewing their options.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Protesters gather outside the Sheraton Grand Sacramento Hotel in Sacramento on May…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":388039,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-388038","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388038","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388038"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388038\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/388039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}