A hearing on a permanent injunction is scheduled next month. Wilson has refused to negotiate with tribes with ongoing gambling operations, and as a result, no tribe in California, including those with casinos in the Inland Empire, has an agreement with the state. States and tribes have entered into 161 agreements, called compacts, in 24 states, including Nevada, where five compacts have been negotiated. Without such compacts, their activities are illegal, said Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., a member of the Senate Select Committee on Indian Affairs. He has opposed the California casinos on the grounds that they are unregulated and hurt more tightly regulated gambling like that in his state.
Unregulated gaming is an incentive to corruption.
Campbell, the only Indian in Congress, is unlikely to comply. Earlier this year he wrote a letter to the attorney general backing the California tribes when United States attorneys sought to shut down their video gambling machines. The California gambling tribes, including nine in Riverside and San Bernardino counties, are frustrated with Wilson. Under the 1988 Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, tribes were required to negotiate compacts with governors, but many governors have refused. A recent court decision opened the way for the Department of Interior to negotiate the compacts in the event governors do not cooperate.