{"id":3581,"date":"2026-07-02T13:59:05","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T13:59:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casinousa.com\/news\/?p=3581"},"modified":"2026-07-02T13:59:05","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T13:59:05","slug":"california-court-blocks-blackjack-ban-attempt-in-the-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casinousa.com\/news\/california-court-blocks-blackjack-ban-attempt-in-the-state","title":{"rendered":"No-Go: California Court Blocks Blackjack Ban Attempt in the State"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.casinousa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/blackjack.jpg\" width=\"300\" alt=\"Blackjack\" class=\"alignleft size-medium\" title=\"No-Go: California Court Blocks Blackjack Ban Attempt in the State\"\/><strong>Summary:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A California court decided that state regulators do not have the necessary authority to impose a statewide ban on blackjack.<\/li>\n<li>The decision saved thousands of jobs and protected a major source of revenue connected to the industry.<\/li>\n<li>Any future ban on banked card games requires legislature.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>California licensed card rooms can breathe easily now that a judge decided that <strong>state gambling regulators are not legally authorized to ban <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casinousa.com\/games\/blackjack\">blackjack games<\/a> at their venues<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard Darwin<\/strong>\u2019s ruling marks an important victory for licensed card room operators like <strong>Fresno&#8217;s Club One Casino<\/strong> that heavily use blackjack and similar games as an important source of income.<\/p>\n<p>Judge Darwin concluded that the Bureau of Gambling Control within the California Attorney General&#8217;s Office did not have the authority to introduce regulations that would prohibit these games. <\/p>\n<p>Instead, the judge decided that all major changes to the state\u2019s gambling laws must come from the state Legislature.<\/p>\n<p>During his ruling, Darwin explained that the Bureau had acted beyond the powers granted to it under the state&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/oag.ca.gov\/sites\/all\/files\/agweb\/pdfs\/gambling\/gca2008.pdf\">Gambling Control Act<\/a> by trying to introduce the proposed restrictions.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"the-banked-games-controversy\">The Banked Games Controversy <\/h2>\n<p>The dispute revolves around banked games, where players compete directly against the house rather than one another. California&#8217;s tribal casinos have long argued that they hold exclusive rights to offer these games. <\/p>\n<p>Card rooms, however, have operated modified versions of blackjack by using third-party proposition players, a practice that has remained at the heart of a lengthy legal battle.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Kyle Kirkland<\/strong>, president of the California Gaming Association, welcomed the decision, describing it as a confirmation that regulators cannot rewrite state law without legislative approval. <\/p>\n<p>He argued that the proposed rules would have harmed local businesses, employees and communities while benefiting a limited number of tribal gaming operators.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"costly-prohibition\">Costly Prohibition<\/h2>\n<p>Economic concerns also played a major role throughout the case, with an <a href=\"https:\/\/oag.ca.gov\/system\/files\/media\/isor-appendix-d-revised-sria-corrected.pdf\">assessment prepared by Berkeley Economic Advising and Research<\/a> estimating that banning the <strong>games could have cost California card rooms about $464 million over the next decade<\/strong> while eliminating an estimated 364 full time jobs each year. <\/p>\n<p>The same report projected tribal casinos would see revenue gains of approximately $232 million.<\/p>\n<p>For Fresno area casinos, blackjack represents a substantial share of overall business. Operators warned that losing the games could have forced job cuts, affected hundreds of local families and reduced tax revenue paid to city governments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Summary: A California court decided that state regulators do not have the necessary authority to impose a statewide ban on blackjack. The decision saved thousands of jobs and protected a major source of revenue connected to the industry. Any future ban on banked card games requires legislature. California licensed card rooms can breathe easily now [&hellip;]","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,5,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-industry","category-legal"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>No-Go: California Court Blocks Blackjack Ban Attempt in the State<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A California judge has ruled that state regulators exceeded their authority in their attempt to impose a ban on blackjack games at licensed card rooms.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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