FanDuel on Monday will announce that it is further building out its effort at tribal relations with the hire of former National Indian Gaming Commission chairman E. Sequoyah Simermeyer, the company exclusively shared with Sports Handle. The hire is FanDuel’s third of an executive with a background in tribal gaming in the last six months.
Simermeyer will be a vice president for strategic partnerships. He s former San Manuel Band of Mission Indians COO Rikki Tanenbaum, who was hired in October as a senior vice president for strategic partnerships, and Frank Sizemore, former San Manuel vice president of operations, who was hired in January — also as a vice president for strategic partnerships.
The hirings represent FanDuel’s effort to engage Indian Country and develop meaningful partnerships across the country. The company is already partnered with Connecticut’s Mohegan Tribe and California, positioning itself for when sports betting eventually becomes legal in the state.
“I think it’s another positive step forward. I still think we have a long way to go, but I think it’s important to have these steps as we look to the future of what the expansion of gaming in California and across Indian Country,” James Siva, chairman of the California Nations Indian Gaming Association, told Sports Handle. “This is the first time that any of these companies are looking to work with Indian Country.”
‘I think it shows a seriousness’ 3j3c4n
The news of Simermeyer’s unexpected resignation from the NIGC was made public last Wednesday, and the news circulated quickly around the Western Indian Gaming Conference at the Pechanga Casino Resort in suburban Los Angeles. The announcement did not include where Simermeyer was headed.
“He’s a big deal; I think it shows a seriousness,” Victor Rocha, founder of Pechanga.net and conference chairman for the Indian Gaming Association, told Sports Handle. “Sequoyah is really ired because he listens. He’s done a great job of taking more of a hands-off approach.”
NIGC Announces Departure of Chairman E. Sequoyah Simermeyer
Full press release can be viewed at https://t.co/hmBNZJ1UUI and link below.https://t.co/8erIpXtvXW pic.twitter.com/E0iTO4T4AB
— National Indian Gaming Commission (@NIGCgov) February 21, 2024
Simermeyer, who was appointed to his NIGC position by then-President Donald Trump in 2019, will be tasked with building “sustainable commercial relationships across the United States.” Tribal gaming is different from state to state, and while commercial operators have been able to get market access in states — including Michigan — they have been shut out of Florida and California, the latter of which doesn’t have legal wagering.
In 2022, a group of seven commercial operators, including FanDuel, ran a ballot initiative in California that would have brought online sports betting to the state and required sportsbooks to partner with tribal casinos. The proposal was not well received in Indian Country despite operators seeking input from the tribes, and California’s tribes ultimately spent about $250 million to kill the initiative. The coalition of operators spent the same amount trying to push their idea forward.
Earlier that same year, a political action committee representing sports betting in Florida.
Since those defeats, FanDuel has changed its tack, and last week publicly apologized to California’s tribes for its “uninformed and misguided” attempt to legalize without acknowledging the tribes’ goal of driving the process. California’s tribes have had exclusivity for gaming for three decades, and have shown they will fight at any cost to retain that. While neither side has revealed what that might look like, FanDuel is the first major operator to publicly state its willingness to make amends, “listen and learn,” and build meaningful relationships.
In many states, tribes have been granted exclusivity for Class III gaming, which is governed on a federal level by the 1988 Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. That exclusivity has allowed tribes to pull themselves out of poverty, to provide jobs for their , and to offer an array services to their and surrounding communities.
“It’s good to have those steps, and I think even having FanDuel at WIGC was a step toward that, but our narrative is going to be the same, which is that the tribes will remain in control, we have to remain in control, we’ve done too much to give that up,” Siva said. “And I think they (commercial operators) are beginning to understand that.”
Excited to work ‘within Indian Country’ 40x12
Simermeyer is FanDuel’s first hire for this initiative who is an enrolled member of a tribe. His Coharie Tribe in North Carolina has been recognized by the state since 1971 but does not have federal recognition. The tribe has more than 3,000 and is not involved in gaming.
“I am ing the private sector for the first time, and it mattered to me to a team where I could use my background as a former regulator, legislative staffer, and public servant to Indian Country,” Simermeyer said via press release. “FanDuel is the leader in mobile gaming and has helped shape the rise of the legalized and regulated marketplace in the U.S. Mobile gaming remains a very young and dynamic industry, and I’m excited to help the team build out our capacity to work within Indian Country nationally to take advantage of opportunities ahead.”
Before serving at the NIGC, Simermeyer was an advisor to the chairman to the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs and was a deputy chief of staff to the DOI’s Secretary for Indian Affairs under multiple istrations. Prior to that, he worked for the National Congress of American Indians. Simermeyer got his undergraduate degree in environmental studies at Dartmouth before earning a masters degree in environmental law and policy at Vermont and his juris doctor at Cornell.
“I think he’s done a lot of really great things … and if they are going to do what they are going to do — be an ally and work with Indian Country — then I think it will be great,” Rocha said.
