Some of you may remember the story about the Morongo Band of Mission Indians and their foray into online casinos.  Well, from the outrage of the rest of the tribal gaming community, it made it seem as if the Morongo Band were a shortsighted group looking to get ahead of the competition even if it meant ruining tribal gaming in California forever.

That obviously is a one sided version of the story.  According to Robert Martin, chairman of the Morongo Band, the intentions of his tribe were to preserve the future of Indian tribes in the gambling market.

Martin claims his tribe made a move to gain exclusive rights to online poker in California when it was discovered that the California legislature had intended to add a piece of online poker legislation onto a federal health care bill.  From the looks of things, all systems were go for the bill to pass.

If they had succeeded in passing this bill, Martin claims the federal treasury would have stumbled across a “$40 billion pot of gold” at the expense of tribal casinos.  The Morongo Band sought rights to online poker as an attempt to prevent the Congress from stealing the ability of tribes to compete in the online casino and online gambling market place.

“Steps had to be taken to protect financial interests against erosion from off-shore companies and Las Vegas corporations,” said Martin.
 
“We rushed to Congress to beat back a bill that would have restricted our participation.  That is why we were simultaneously working in Sacramento on our own California Internet poker legislation.”