US House freezes casino bills after opposition from Donald Trump

House Democrats on Wednesday were forced to delay votes on a pair of tribal casino bills after President Donald Trump issued a tweet urging Republicans to vote against one of the two bills. If passed, H.R. 312 would clear the way for a new casino to be built in Massachusetts on land belonging to the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe. A related piece of legislation, H.R. 375, would allow the Interior Department to take land into trust for Native American tribes — land on which the tribes could then operate casinos.

The Interior Department last year overturned an Obama-era decision allowing for the trust, which threw a planned USD 1 billion casino project into doubt. But the House Natural Resources Committee recently approved the bill, and it was put on the fast track for a vote on the House floor this week, a vote that would require two-thirds of the House to support it.

Within 90 minutes of Trump’s tweet, the legislation was pulled. It’s not clear that this was because of the tweet. Politico reported that there was unrest within the House GOP conference about the bill Tuesday night. Although it passed in committee 26 to 10, it did so with just three Republican votes and 10 opposed. That suggested that two-thirds was hardly assured in the House.

Republicans shouldn’t vote for H.R. 312, a special interest casino Bill, backed by Elizabeth (Pocahontas) Warren. It is unfair and doesn’t treat Native Americans equally!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) 8 de mayo de 2019

It's unusual for a president to use the weight of the office to publicly support or oppose a bill that impacts a private sector venture, US media outlets point out. Trump's tweet was also unusual because of the timing. Before the tweet on Wednesday, sent just hours before a vote in the full House, Trump had never spoken about the issue in public, CNBC reported.

About an hour before Trump sent his tweet, a top outside adviser to the White House and a friend of the president's, Matt Schlapp, tweeted a similar message, writing that the passage of H.R. 312 would be a "reward" for Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

Schlapp is president of the American Conservative Union and a registered lobbyist with a firm called Cove Strategies, which lobbies on behalf of casino operator Twin Rivers Management Group. His wife, Mercedes Schlapp, is a senior White House communications aide. In January of this year, Twin Rivers Management hired Schlapp and Cove Strategies to lobby on "gaming issues."

The attempt to circumvent the established legal process to create a new Indian casino in Massachusetts is a terrible idea and proper legal protocols must be followed. That is why I am pleased to devout time and effort to stopping this casino.

— Matt Schlapp (@mschlapp) 8 de mayo de 2019

Representative William Keating, a Massachusetts Democrat from Bourne who sponsored the bill, suggested Trump’s opposition to the proposal was rooted in his connection to a lobbyist for a company that owns two casinos in Rhode Island. “So why tweet against a bill recognizing the tribe of first Thanksgiving?” Keating asked on Twitter. “Because of his well-documented alliance with the RI casino lobbyist. A weak attempt to hide corrupt influence in a racist tweet.” Keating said he was confident the bill would be passed “sooner versus later,” The Boston Glob reported.

Twin River said in a statement that the legislation “conflicts with federal district court and U.S. Department of Interior decisions as well as precedent set by the U.S. Supreme Court. Clearly, the legislation appears to be an effort to circumvent the courts and U.S. Department of the Interior, which have jurisdiction over these matters,” the company said.